I will have to think about the re-design of the home page to give it more impact and to emphasize the reasons to contribute more. The reasons you provided are strong and comprehensive, but maybe overlooked because they are not on the first page ( at least a few reasons need to be on the home page). At least that is my opinion. I will come up with a few proposals for consideration, give me some time on this.

Regards,

Danielle.

I created a list of reasons to contribute to the site, a while back which covers your last point. Feel free to expand on it if you have some more ideas.

I think a presence at conferences is good idea. I have thought about it before, but never really followed up on it.
I started working on a Slide Show that could be used as the basis of a presentation, and I thought a Youtube video might be another good plan of attack.

Getting mentors on board would be great. I am sure there must be at least one person at every Council that will see the value of the site. The trick is finding them.

Regards,

Wayne.

LGAM does need its profile raised. Here are some ideas:

• Offer CPD points to IEAust members, for example, for contributing to this site. The exact number of points for what type of contributions could be teased out.

• There are some organizations that have workplace mentors, they could be identified and encourage them to ask their mentees to sign up to LGAM and thus become aware of what it can offer. Over time, as the mentees' expertise grows, they could be motivated to contribute.

• We could organize to have a table or banner displayed at any conferences that cater for LG professionals. Preferably this would be sponsored by one or more councils.

• LGAM link should be on each council's internal website.

• The LGAM home page could do with redesign to make it obvious that it is a collaborative information sharing site. It needs to have an 'in-your-face' impact the minute someone first lands on the site. I know the aim of the site is stated clearly in the first paragraph, but remember that we are becoming more and more visually oriented and so communication needs to have a stronger visual impact to be noticed.

• It is also necessary to list in point form the benefits of this site to councils and to contributors.

That's the way I see it ;-)

Creating tables with wiki syntax can be painful. I usually use the concatenate function in Excel to generate the code and then paste it into the page.

Regards,

Wayne.

LEGISLATION ADMINISTERED BY COUNCIL
The list of Acts
below are categorised according to the following legend:

A = Administered by Council – The Act specifically confers discretionary powers and responsibility to Council to administer some of the Act’s provisions within Council’s local government area.
E = Empowered by, but Council does not administer – Council has limited powers of enforcement under the Act or has limited discretionary powers of determination.
R = Recourse to Council only – The Act has some recourse provisions under which Council is the responsible agency.
A E R
The Local Government was constituted by the Local Government (Adjustment of Boundaries) Act 1978.

The functions of the Local Government are contained in the Local Government Act 1993 and other legislation such as:
Acquisition of Land Act 1967 X
Acquisition of Land Regulation 2003 X
Acts Interpretation Act 1954 X
Animal Care and Protection Act 2001 X
Animal Management (Cats and Dogs) 2008 X
Anti-Discrimination Act 1991and Tribunal Rule 2005 X X
Associations Incorporation Act 1981 and Regulation 1999 X
Body Corporate and Community Management Act 1997 and Regulations X
Building Act 1975 X
Building Regulation 2006 X
Building Code of Australia 1990 X
Building and Construction Industry Payments Act 2004 X
Dangerous Goods (Safety) Management Act 2001 and Regulations 2001 X
Disaster Management Act 2003 X
Disposal of Uncollected Goods Act 1967-1995 X
Electoral Act 1992-1996 and Regulation 1992 X
Electoral and Administrative Review Act 1989,1990,1993 X
Environmental Protection Act 1994 X
Environmental Protection Regulation 1998 X
Environmental Protection (Water) 1997 Policy X
Environmental Protection (Noise) 1997 X
Environmental Protection (Air) 1997 X
Environmental Protection (Waste Management) Regulation 2000 X
Evidence Act 1977 and Regulations X
Evidence and Discovery Act 1867-1967 X
Exotic Diseases in Animals Act 1981 X
Explosives Act 1999 and Regulations X
Equal Opportunity in Public Employment Act 1992 X X
Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act 1999 (C'th) X X
Factories and Shops Act 1960-1987, and Regulations X
Food Act 2006 X
Food Production (Safety) Act 2000 X
Forestry Act 1959-1995, and Regulations X
Guide Dogs Act 1972 X
Health Act 1937 and Regulations 1996 X
Holidays Act 1983 X
Information Privacy Act and Regulations 2009 X
Integrated Planning Act (IPA) 1997/Sustainable Planning Act 2009 X X
Judicial Review Act 1991 X
Justices Act and Regulations X X
Land Act 1994 and Regulation 1995 X
Land Protection (Pest & Stock Route Management) Act 2002 and Regulation X
Libraries Act 1988 X
Liquor Act 1992 X
Local Government Act 1993 and Regulation and Standard X
Local Government Finance Standard 2005 X
Payroll Tax Act 1971and Regulation X
Penalties and Sentences Act 1992 X
Plumbing and Drainage Act 2002 X
Plumbing and Drainage Regulation 2003 X
Property Law Act 1974 and Regulation 2003 X
Public Health Act 2005 X
Public Health Regulation 2005 X
Public Records Act 2002 and Regulation X
Right to Information Act and Regulations 2009 X
Sewerage and Water Supply Act 1949 X
South East Qld (Distribution & Retail Restructuring) & Natural Resources Provisions 2009 X
Standard Plumbing and Drainage Regulation 2003 X
State Counter-Disaster Organisation Act 1975 X
State Penalties Enforcement Act 1999 and Regulations X X
Stock Identification Regulation 2005 X
Subcontractors Charges Act 1974 X
Sustainability Planning Act 2009 X
Surveyors Act 1977-1995 and Regulations X
Transport Infrastructure Act 1994 and Regulations X
Transport Operations (Road Use Management) Act 1995 and Regulations X
Valuation of Land Act 1944 and Regulations X
Water Act 2000 X
Water Supply (Safety and Reliability) Act 2008 X
Water Regulation 2002 X
Water Efficiency Labelling and Standards Act 2005 X
Worker's Compensation and Rehabilitation Act 2003 and Regulations X
Workplace Health & Safety Act 1995 and Regulation X
Codes of Practice - Various X
Workplace Health & Safety Advisory & Compliance Standards - Various X

- Development of ADAC through IPEWAQ might be an example of active participation by volunteers under IPWEA governance (not in number but quality/ownership).

My opinion, one key challenge of WIKI might be lack of acknowledgement or satisfaction in doing work for contribution back to industry/society.

May be, it does not have enough branding (or buy in) in its simple WIKI format. It will be easily saleable to CEOs/Managers if there is independent governance behind it (rather than as Wayne acknowledged, it is more of 1 man show)

More people may commit /take these activities seriously, if it is backed by an organisation. It is no different than IPWEA/IE Aust or similar industry specific organisations, but this time around "OPEN source/ FREE" is attached to it. This is my percetion.

I might be totally out of context/intent of LGAM.

I agree that the Content menu needs to have judiciously selected links or else there will be too much. It's fairly long now but can probably accommodate a few more. A poll to determine what should be on the main menu might be the way to go at this stage.

Regards,

It is a bit of a balancing act trying to decide what to include in the side menu. I have always thought if we put too many links there it will become too busy. On the other hand it is important that site users are able to find information they want in a couple of mouse clicks.

I have just added an alphabetical index to the top of the home page. I'm not sure why I have never gotten around to doing that before, but hopefully another way of finding information on the site will help a bit. Having siad all that, the Australian Legislation page is not all that comprehensive at the moment, but perhaps when it is fleshed out a bit more adding a link to it on the side menu wouldn't hurt.

Perhaps we should have a poll to see what links users would like to see in the side menu?

Regards,

Wayne.

Regards,

Wayne.

The structure of the section could be as follows:
* Legislation
* Related pages
—>Federal Legislation
- List of Federal legislation
—> State Legislation
- List of States
— List of State legislation

We could then also have a subsection with links to cases that related to specific legislation.

I admit to having special interest in this because apart from studying civil engineering, I am also in the final stage of a law degree.

What do others think of this suggestion?

I cannot think of any persuasive arguments for incorporating LGAM as a non-profit organisation. I don't know of any examples where a move of this type, specifically where it relates to a wiki, has resulted in increased membership or active participation. If there is precedent, I would be keen to know about it.

Why would a non-profit wiki necessarily attract more participation? After all, it is non-profit now and wikis are known to be a product of the free and voluntary collaboration of individuals.

Do you have an example where such a move did result in greater active participation?

I was just wondering that, by having non for profit organisation or association leading LGAM and alike activities would be beneficial and have more marketing power? Will that result in enhanced participation and recognition among peers and senior mgmt?

It will still have focus of open source/free sharing of knowledge in its constitution?

Will active members have support? and be likely a volunteer key office bearer?

Info on setting up not for profit org:
http://www.asic.gov.au/asic/asic.nsf/byheadline/Registering+not-for-profit+or+charitable+organisations?openDocument

Info on association
http://www.fairtrading.qld.gov.au/associations-nonprofits.htm

Just as a concept to brainstorm through.

I think I interpreted Chris' question a bit differently to you. I thought he was asking about publishing the advice of professional solicitors, not about giving out Adhoc legal advice.
Perhaps we need a legal opinion on if it is OK to share legal opinions?!

Perhaps case studies here might be appropriate BUT NOT advice. But even this would require heavy disclaimers.

Most of our current advice here is from engineers and practitioners to engineers on a "use as appropriate" professionally acceptable basis (so disclaimer not necessary as it is implied).
DP

Welcome to the site and the forum.

It isn't really my field, but I suspect that publishing legal advice is probably OK providing their are no privacy issues associated with it.
I know that LGAQ circulates legal opinions from time to time, and publish them on their website in the members area.

I have given a link to the most recent one below, although you won't be able to view it unless you can log in to LGOnline.
http://www.lgaq.asn.au/group/guest/home/-/journal_content/56/10136/7BFB77B2C5312C9B81178258B6AE5DBE

I might try contacting them (LGAQ) tomorrow to get their take on the issue.

When you change the title it can sometimes cause problems with existing links. It is usually best to create a new page and copy the contents across to the new page, and depending on the situation make the original page a redirect page.

I have made a copy, but I have left both pages the same for the moment.

I think perhaps ABEF & Six Sigma should be on the Business Improvement page, and the other links on the problem solving techniques page, but I am open to further suggestions.

ABEF certainly references a range of problem solving techniques, I don't know so much about Six Sigma, but I think it might too.