Binjari Aboriginal Community has had a win recently securing the tender for its own rubbish collection.
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Debra Aloisi, Binjari CEO, said the new tender is increasing employment and helping the community on a wide scale.
“It is all about having people in the community do the work that needs to be done,” Ms Aloisi said.
Previously, Katherine Town Council dispatched their workers to the outlying community, 15 minutes from Katherine, to collect the rubbish.
It was a job that could easily be done by a person from the community, Ms Aloisi said.
“[The tender] is providing people with jobs, keeping them accountable, giving them a purpose and keeping them drug free,” she said.
This is not the first tender the small community has won.
Ms Aloisi said millions of dollars have been secured so far, going towards upgrading community buildings.
“Binjari gets no funding, so to survive we have to go out and look for contracts,” she said.
To obtain work in the community from the tenders there are two stipulations, Ms Aloisi said.
“They have to turn up to CDP every day for reliability and be drug free.”
The new rubbish collection truck arrived at the community today and Ernest Burns, previously a supervisor at Roper Golf, is the first person to be employed in the new rubbish collection position.
“I changed to help out,” he said.
He said his new position will be changing peoples lives and most importantly helping his family.
“We help ourselves out here,” he said.
From providing jobs and a sense of purpose to men in the community the new tender is just the beginning with plans to secure more rubbish collection tenders for the future.
The rubbish will be collected in the new truck and taken to Katherine’s dump.
Recycling already happens at an individual level in the community, Ms Aloisi said, and the new tender will ensure that continues.