River Safety Campaign sees Hawkesbury City Council secure local government excellence award

June 10, 2025

The 2025 NSW Local Government Excellence Awards were held at a gala dinner at The Star in Sydney on 5th June 2025 with councils attending from across Sydney and NSW.

Hawkesbury City Council secured the award for Special Projects, population 50,000 to 150,000 for the Hawkesbury River Safety Campaign which was developed in consultation with Royal Life Saving NSW.

The awards are hosted by Local Government Professionals Australia NSW and celebrate outstanding achievements within NSW local government. Council was also a finalist in the Community Partnerships, Customer Service and First Nations Community Partnership categories.

The win follows the 2024 RH Dougherty Events and Communications Award – Excellence in Communication (population 30,000-100,000) received in August 2024.

The Hawkesbury River Safety Campaign was developed in response to drownings in the Hawkesbury River at Macquarie Park in Windsor.

The campaign centred around new river safety signs developed in consultation with Royal Life Saving NSW using best practise design, and internationally recognised safety symbols. Versions of the signs have also been created in the five most common non-English languages for visitors to the Hawkesbury – Hindi, Punjabi, Simplified Chinese, Arabic and Filipino – which can be accessed by a QR Code via a smartphone.

The signs were supported by a multi-lingual awareness campaign on social media urging visitors to consider other fun activities around the river instead of swimming in local waterways.

Visitors to Council’s tent at the Hawkesbury Show in 2024 were invited to take a river safety pledge and place their pledge on a special artwork created for the event by Hawkesbury Remakery. Pledges were recorded and used to create a multilingual video for social media for use in ongoing campaigns.

Image top. Hawkesbury River Safety Campaign; image below: David Catt and Adriana Bellomo receiving the 2025 NSW Local Government Excellence Award

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