Community
26 September, 2025
Teamwork and cooperation
LAKE Bullen Merri’s South Beach Committee of Management last week worked with a number of lake enthusiasts to build a new feature and maintain the beach, showing many hands make light work.
A working bee was held last Sunday to maintain the greens of the south beach as well as construct a windbreak wall at the barbecue area.
Committee president Phil Russell said the project was funded by money returned from a Ritchies card a committee member had set up in recent years.
“We wanted to direct that to a project, and so the project we decided on was to put in a windbreak in the barbecue area up at South Beach,” he said.
“We had a few volunteers come up on Sunday to help with that, and we had another group of people who love the lake and wanted to contribute, but they didn’t want to be on a committee.
“We’ve now got a little add-on group of people – Friends of Lake Bullen Merri South Beach – who all rolled up with their whipper-snippers, energy and enthusiasm to attack some of the weeds in the overgrown areas up at the lake to make life a bit easier for the others.
“We then put on a barbecue and had a couple of drinks – it was a terrific day.
“The support we had with the new people has been sensational.”
A total of 12 people spent the day working on the southern beach, showing the recently-developed Friends of South Beach Committee is increasing the number of volunteers maintaining the area.
“As a committee we recognized some time ago we have many in our community who would love the opportunity to contribute by volunteering to an organization like South Beach Committee of Management, but needed it to be less formal,” Mr Russell said.
“The opportunity to contribute is this way has been positively received and we now have an additional group of people to support us which we greatly appreciate.
“It was an opportunity to run through the scope of works we do up there as volunteers to the new people who are interested.
“Not to waste the opportunity, they all decided to jump on their whipper snippers and help clean up some areas and with the building of the new wall.
“Among the group there was a wide range of different experiences and capabilities of the people who showed up, and we just encouraged all of them to have an input because there are certainly things that they know about they can certainly help out with – whether it be building, weed control, maintenance, or other suggestions.”
Mr Russell extended his gratitude to Camperdown’s Ritchies store and their Community Benefits program for enabling them to source materials locally.
“Thanks Richie’s and thanks to all involved with South Beach Committee of Management and those who continue to support us and the users who help us keep South Beach at Lake Bullen Merri to the standard we can all enjoy and appreciate
“One of the committee members summed the day up in a message late yesterday – ‘fantastic to see so many people helping out, what a great community we live in’.”
Read More: Camperdown