Tidy Towns Program Background

What is Tidy Towns?

Tidy Towns is about cooperation and community involvement.
Provides an incentive for existing environmental and/or community groups to work together to achieve a common vision for a better environment, a sustainable community and improved quality of life.
Tidy Towns is a program that brings communities together to undertake practical actions to enhance and conserve their built and natural environment.
A program that ensures communities do the best with what they’ve got to ensure a sustainable future.

A framework to encourage and/or extend beautification, education, environmental, cultural, etc. programs.

Tidy Towns offers the framework to encourage or extend various improvements, beautification, education, environmental and cultural programs that may already be in progress.
A comprehensive approach to a better environment and a stronger community.
Enables Keep Australia Beautiful to encourage and recognise towns, schools, organisations and individuals involved in long term projects.
A Tidy Town is a community that works together towards a common goal of improving its appearance and environmental quality.
Strong community involvement is the key to success.
Broad community sector involvement provides strong ownership of town developments.
Through participation, community members gain greater awareness of local and general environmental issues.

Benefits to towns becoming involved in the program include a social, environmental and economic focus – all about sustainability.

Increased community pride and raised self esteem
Increased interaction between broad range of community groups
Encourages an inter-generational approach between varying age groups within a community.
Social cooperation
Encourages a clean and green sustainable community
Enables a community to become more aware of their local environment
Encourages innovative approaches to environmental challenges
Litter prevention and encourages community ‘ownership’ of problem through clean ups, etc
Better waste minimisation and management
Community awareness and educational benefits
Improved facilities, features and town presentation
Improved health standards
Opportunities for tourism promotion and related ‘flow on’ benefits.

An effectively planned community-driven Tidy Towns program includes:

A developed vision of what a community wants for a sustainable future. Preferably linked to Shire/Council’s local environment plan, if available.
A useful resource for planning future directions.
Budget factor.
Action Plan – what/when/where/ how to get the job done.
Equipment/resources – who/what to use to get the job done.
Promotion – how to expose our program.
Evaluation – where have we been?
Future strategies – where do we go from here?