Farewell from Sandringham Foreshore Association

Special message from the President Dr Vicki Karalis and the Chair Helen Gibson

27th October 2023

Sandringham Foreshore Association
Sandringham VIC 3191
sandyforeshore@optusnet.com.au
Website: https://sandringhamforeshore.tumblr.com/

Dearest Friends and Members of the Sandringham Foreshore Association

We would like to acknowledge the Bunurong people of the Kulin Nation as the Traditional Owners and
Custodians of this Land,
and pay our respects to the Elders, past, present, and emerging.

It is with a heavy heart the Sandringham Foreshore Association (SFA) committee have decided to
dissolve the Association. The decision was not made lightly – SFA have achieved many of the goals and
objectives it set out to achieve since foundation as a small group in 2007. As we look back on 16 years of
achievements, while growing to over 800 passionate followers, we are immensely proud of the work done.
SFA is a charitable not-for-profit association. Membership has always been free. Our goals have included:

• Our self-acclaimed role to foster and promote good natural conservation principles to Bayside
foreshore management
• To assist through public education by aligning ourselves with scientific experts in fields of
conservation and natural environment
• To facilitate effective communication between community – council, state, and federal
governments by aligning ourselves with peer-reviewed, scientific, and environmental publications
and position statements
• To care for and help protect our local beaches and cliffs
• To educate, raise awareness and preserve our local archaeological, geological, cultural,
indigenous and heritage sites such as the Beaumaris Bay and Black Rock fossil sites

Our constitution can be found here on our website which will remain as a live archive in perpetuity:
SFA Constitution

SFA have always valued our positive relationship with local indigenous members, local, state and federal
government departments such as Bayside City Council, the City of Kingston Council, the Department of
Environment, Energy & Climate Action [DEECA, formerly DELWP, DEPI, .. etc], the National Heritage
Department, Parks Victoria, Safe Transport Victoria – Maritime, Museums Victoria, and many other
coastal departments we have had the privilege of working with. SFA are also grateful to have worked
closely with a large number of local groups, and in more recent times with the Beaumaris Motor Yacht
Squadron (BMYS), forging positive relationships with their executives who assisted us with our charity
work. We would also like to thank the many state ministers and politicians we have had the privilege to
meet and work with, including former Sandringham MP Murray Thompson OAM and our current
Sandringham MP Brad Rowswell, both of whom have been particularly helpful and supportive. SFA were
able to regularly visit the foreshore with officials who never refused to walk with us on the beautiful
Sandringham and Bayside beaches to discuss our various concerns and campaigns.

As well, SFA would like to acknowledge the pioneering Bayside “Elders” such as Mr Ray Lewis OAM,
Professor Emeritus John Buckeridge, Mrs Elizabeth Jensen, Mr Geoffrey Goode OAM, Ms Pauline
Reynolds, Ms Nina Earle, Cr & former Mayor Laurence Evans OAM [Bayside City Council], Cr & former
Mayor Steve Staikos [Kingston City Council], Mr David Bell, Mr Les Sabo, and Mr Graeme Disney OAM
[recently deceased] for their ongoing guidance, leadership and support. Of extra special note, we have
highly valued the commitment and work done by SFA Patrons Professor Tim Flannery and Professor John
Long who both grew up in Bayside, and also acknowledge Dr Erich Fitzgerald, Palaeontologist at
Museums Victoria. Without them SFA would not have had the same depth of respect and wealth of
knowledge for the betterment of our natural foreshore environment.
To our followers and friends of SFA: We are most particularly truly grateful and appreciative of all your
support and allegiance over many years, as without you we could not have achieved our numerous goals.
We respect and value all the kind people who have worked with us over the last 16+ years.

Finally, we would particularly like to thank the current active and former committee members of SFA:

Vicki Karalis AM - President & Founder of SFA; Medical practitioner

Helen Gibson - Chair; Geologist and Renewable Energy advisor
Alison Horton - Vice President & Public officer/secretary; Perfusionist
Adrienne Smith - Committee member; IT consultant
Ike Solomon - Committee member; Corrosion engineer
Artemis Siourthas - Committee member; Website Administrator, Fundraising volunteer; Contributed to
and wrote SFA newsletters; Environmental Scientist and Human Geographer, Monash University.
Cassandra Karalis - Committee member, Director of Communications 2014-2021; Developed SFA
website in 2014; Coordinated scientific community outreach via social media & assisted with Fundraising
administration; Marine Biologist, James Cook University, QLD.

Former committee members:

John Amiet - former Committee member of SFA; Professional Photographer
Laurence Evans OAM - former Committee member of SFA & now Councillor & former Mayor, Bayside
City Council
John Hede – former Committee member of SFA; Architect
Salva Crusca -former Committee member of SFA; Counsellor
Craig Francis - former Committee member of SFA; teacher & radio broadcaster 88.3 Southern FM

SFA achievements

Our achievements through SFA have included, but are not limited to:

• Monitoring the Sandringham Foreshore and Bayside beaches for beach and cliff erosion and
working with authorities to achieve remediation
• Uploading 1000’s of images of the Bayside beaches experiencing erosion via the Fluker Posts
citizen science system, from Tennyson St, Royal Ave and Red Bluff locations
• Advocating for regular sand renourishment of Sandringham beaches
• Reducing the length and height of the Southey St rock groyne to improve its aesthetics and
create less erosion to the adjacent beaches
• Aligning ourselves with environmental community groups to assist our agenda of protecting the
Bayside beaches
• Participating in the citizen science drone program for monitoring sand movement and the
foreshore’s land-surface and shallow water profile (principal program managers: Deakin
University)
• Providing community advice, caring for and contributing to stakeholder meetings in relation to
Bayside foreshore matters e.g. advice on the:
o Brighton beach erosion
o Restoration of the Hampton harbour
o Erosion of Sandringham beaches
o Black Rock beach erosion and sea wall restoration
o Fossil sites at Beaumaris Bay and Black Rock
• Objecting to the Port Phillip Bay dredging and participating as stakeholders in the advisory
process
• Highlighting the significance of the Beaumaris Bay and Black Rock fossil sites
• Working with a number of community groups to raise funds for Museums Victoria, to support the
excellent work by Dr Erich Fitzgerald, senior Curator of Palaeontology -collectively raising up to
$50,000 through community efforts, several Council grants via SFA, & a donation from Bendigo
Bank, Sandringham
• Supporting and contributing to research on the Bayside fossils and helping to create a pictorial
local Bayside fossil identification by Museums Victoria
• Preparing and submitting an extensive application and report supporting the National Heritage
Listing for the Beaumaris Bay fossil site
• Providing numerous lectures and regular educational articles promoting the protection of natural
environment within the Bayside foreshore zones, curbing beach erosion and retaining a healthy
bay – delivered to schools and community groups. The lectures and relevant resource material
will be uploaded on the SFA website in the near future
• Actively seeking expert reports related to Bayside foreshore issues and securing their efforts to
provide reports (mostly Pro Bono) which will be available on our website for continuing use
• Facilitating regular Walks and Talks as part of the ‘Summer by the Sea’ program on Bayside
coastal processes, beach erosion, geology, geomorphology, fossils and indigenous life
• Providing regular walks and talks on Bayside coastal processes and on Bayside fossil talks to
various High schools for students in Years 8-11
• Featured in Geography Vels textbook Level 6 on Sandringham beach erosion
• Fostering good beach management principles – helping to clean our beaches, opposing the
over-use of herbicide sprays in Bayside, and banning smoking on our beaches
• Promoting more natural and best-practice methods of weed control within the native vegetation
zones along the Bayside cliffs, and hence overseeing a reduction of harmful chemical use
• Working and liaising closely with authorities and stakeholders of the Port Phillip Bay in objecting
to recreational jet skis being permitted on beaches near children and families, and within one
kilometre of the coastline
 • Regularly supervising and mentoring Environmental University students e.g., Deakin and
Monash universities
• Multiple media appearances in relation to local Bayside issues since 2007
• Highlighting the wide significance of the Bayside foreshore and cliffs in the context of
environmental, historical, indigenous, artistic, community and recreational values

Our Legacy will be:

• A continuing presence and ongoing individual participation by many of the committee

members, in preserving and fostering the healthy management of our foreshore’s natural
environmental qualities
• Our website which will remain as a live archive in perpetuity, retaining most of the SFA’s
records, resources, photographs, lecture material and newsletters, and including many expert
reports continuing to be available for private, community and government use
• If you have any ongoing aspirations or wish to take SFA advocacy further, please contact us via
sandyforeshore@optusnet.com.au We will be happy for you to contact us directly for
receiving our guidance and advice into the future.

Looking ahead, we are very pleased that there are now many more voluntary, environmental groups who
are also caring for the Bayside beaches in many ways.

Wishing you good health and continued joy and appreciation of our Bayside beaches 🙏
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With kind regards,

Vicki Karalis, President and Helen Gibson, Chair

On behalf of the SFA Committee, officially closed 30th October 2023
 Sandringham Foreshore Association
January 2007 - October 2023
The Sandringham Foreshore Association was a charitable not-for-profit association. Membership was
free. Our self-acclaimed role was to foster and promote good natural conservation principles to Bayside
foreshore management. Our focus was to assist public education by aligning ourselves with scientific
experts in fields of conservation and natural environment, and to facilitate effective communication
between community – council and state governments – and established environmental science
publications and position statements.
The role of SFA was to care for and help protect our local beaches and cliffs, but also to educate, raise
awareness and preserve our local archaeological, geological, cultural, indigenous and heritage sites such
as the Beaumaris Bay and Black Rock fossil sites.

Copyright: Sandringham Foreshore Association All rights reserved.

Our mailing address is: sandyforeshore@optusnet.com.au

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