Motueka groups aim for Think Water prize

April 4th, 2013
[by David Armstrong]

Three Motueka community organisations are vying with dozens of others in New Zealand for a $50,000 project grant offered by irrigation system supplier Think Water, and your vote will help.

Our Town Motueka, the Motueka Dressage Group and the Motueka Community Garden have submitted proposals for projects that they hope people will vote for. As well as the $15,000 for the top-voted project nation-wide is topped up by $1000 grants for projects within each regional area.

Think Water, which has over 50 branches in Australasia including one in Motueka, specialises in the design and implementation of water-efficient irrigation and water management programs.

Our Town Motueka wants to use the Think Water grant toward the beautification of the town centre by installing an irrigation system for hanging flower baskets in the central business district.

The Hanging Basket initiative has been in place for 2 years, but currently it requires shop owners to manually water their baskets once or twice a day. Our Town Motueka has been working to raise funds to install a permanent irrigation system, which could increase the number of baskets that can be installed.

The Motueka Dressage Group needs water to irrigate their Marchwood Park all-weather surface which, at present, is a dust bowl. They say caravan park campers get really upset with all the dust coming off the surface and gets in their washing.

It is also not good for the horses and riders to be in the dust - at times the horses cough their hearts out and the riders are nearly blinded. The project would be to provide some sort of sprinklers, or watering device that could be turned on at night on a timer.

Motueka Community Gardens wants to use the money to provide irrigation for the glasshouse which it has been given and intends to install behind its garden allotments beside Old Wharf Road.

In the community gardens water is always a critical component, but with a thorough irrigation system in place added to existing basic arrangement, plants raised in the glasshouse could be grown over the winter months and seedlings could get a head start.

Anyone who has Facebook access can vote for any of the projects, and we urge Motueka people to support one of the local project proposals (you can vote only once). The voting closes on April 30th.

To vote, follow the links from Think Water's website or click on one of these two links:
or
www.thinkwater.co.nz/local-hero-campaign.
Do the Facebook login, scan the entries and click on the one which you think is most warranted.

>> , to be added to the page. [If this link doesn't work, use this form instead]

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