Ms Evol McLeod (Chair)

Evol McLeod has worked in arts management and community cultural development for over twenty years.

Positions held include: Manager of Canberra Repertory, Executive Officer and Vice President of the Australian Performing Arts Centres Association, and Director of Tuggeranong Arts Centre. She has worked on many boards and advisory bodies, at both national, state and territory level. Recognition of her work includes the Chief Minister’s International Women’s Day Award for contribution to the arts and community (ACT) the Centenary Medal for providing services to the Tuggeranong Community through the arts, the Telstra Business Women’s Award - ACT (IBM Community and Government Award) and in 2008, the Medal of the Order of Australia for services to the arts as an administrator and advocate and to the community of Canberra.  Evol is actively engaged in the arts and voluntary work for community organisations.

Mr Neil Roach (Treasurer)
Director, Ausdance ACT

Neil Roach has a multi-disciplinary background, from tertiary studies and long experience in a wide variety of arts and events activities, both as a manager and performer. As director of a key arts organization, Ausdance ACT, he works with a wide variety of community, local government, and national stakeholders to promote, educate in, and support dance, with a focus on professional performance. He is a former General Manager of The Street Theatre, Operations Manager of the National Folk Festival, and a partner in the performance group A Bunch of Posers. He has extensive experience as an events manager, stage manager, production manager, theatre director, publicist and performer. Neil has a strong personal commitment to the delivery of a high quality arts experience, whether at a community or professional level, and has served on a number of arts boards, including Treasurer of Canberra Arts Marketing and President of the National Folk Festival.

Mr Graham Bauerle (Secretary)
Phoenix Players

Graham Bauerle( B.Sc, Dip. Ed) was a teacher with the ACT Department of Education,working at several high schools and colleges, trained as a teacher of Science but taught French for the last 14 years of his career. He has worked casually as an office assistant at Walter Turnbull for 6 years. His main interests have been in amateur theatre performance and governance, having been President of Phoenix Players for 7 years. He is presently Vice-President. He particularly enjoys performing in musical productions. He enjoys gardening, reading, fishing and baby-sitting for his two grandsons. One of his major aims is to ensure that the theatre for Belconnen Arts Centre is built.

Ms Dianne Firth
University of Canberra

PhD (UC), BLArch (UC), DipEd (N’cstle), BSc (UNSW), FAILA

Dr Dianne Firth is Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture in the Faculty of Arts and Design at the University of Canberra where she teaches Design studios, Landscape History and supervises research students. Dianne’s current research includes ideas of regional identity, sustainability, local food production, the urban forest and landscape infrastructure.

Her PhD thesis, Behind the Landscape of Lake Burley Griffin: Landscape, water, politics and the national capital 1899-1964, traces the designed landscape of the National Capital through its most critical stages of development, emphasising the importance of key people, political will, comprehensive plans and competent management. The achievement of the Belconnen Arts Centre through community and political action and the implementation of a clear vision and sound design principles have many parallels.

Firth is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects, Deputy Chair of the ACT Heritage Council and acts in an advisory capacity on a number of ACT boards and committees. She is also an internationally recognised textile artist and uses many of the ideas developed from her research and community involvement to inform her creative practice.

Ms Shirley Gourgaud
President, Belconnen Community Council

After gaining my research based Master of Science degree in Physical Chemistry at the University of Queensland in 1980 I moved to Canberra and commenced my Public Service career in the Legislative Research Service, Parliamentary Library, Parliament House, specialising in energy technologies. Later, during my time with the Department of Primary Industries and Energy, I completed a Diploma in Economics from the University of New England. Retiring from the Public Service in 1998, I moved into private research and community work. After serving as Secretary of the Belconnen Community Council for a year, I have served as President since 2008. Currently, I am a Board Member of the Belconnen Arts Centre. During the Interim Board period, I served as a member on the selection committee for the Public Art Acquisition for the Belconnen Arts Centre. Apart from my community advocacy duties, I create jewellery and small sculpture items incorporating various metal techniques, semi-precious stones, crystal, and fabric. 

Alan Kerlin
Gungahlin Community Council spokesman

Alan Kerlin is a volunteer for the Gungahlin Community Council - as the president from 2006 to 2010, and a media spokesman since then. They've been fruitful years, with strong gains in the areas of planning, transport and the environment. In 2011, a community art idea that Alan and another GCC member conceived was realised – to have The Monster That Ate Canberra immortalised in a statue. A large but very friendly bronze Alexander Bunyip now resides outside the Gungahlin Library, encouraging new generations of Canberra children to go into the library and start reading.
Although Alan was born in Queensland and spent a lot of his life there - mainly on the Sunshine Coast - he first lived in Canberra as a child in the 1960s and 70s. Some of his earliest memories include watching Neil Armstrong step onto the moon on Red Hill Primary's only black and white TV, and being one of the first students at the new Scullin Primary, when it was right on the outskirts of town adjoining sheep paddocks.

He now finds himself with a certain amount of déjà vu again living on the outskirts of Canberra, opposite sheep paddocks in Harrison's Wells Station. “Canberra is a gorgeous city with postcard pictures everywhere you go, and it's a wonderful place to bring up children.”

Alan’s work history includes being elected to Queensland’s Maroochy Shire Council, Landcare, IT, small business, and with the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations managing the New Enterprise Incentive Scheme – a program that has helped many people turn their art into businesses.

Ms Maryann Mussared
Strathnairn Arts Association

BA (Applied Arts) COFA @ UNSW

Maryann Mussared is a full time professional artist, freelance photographer and arts writer, and has worked in arts management and community cultural development in the ACT since 1998. Maryann spent three years at the Canberra School of Arts, ANU before graduating from the College of Fine Arts, UNSW, 1997.  Prior to that, Maryann had an extensive career in government, politics, travel and financial services. Recent positions she has held include Manager of Arts Programs, Belconnen Community Service 1998 - 2003; Assistant Director and Communications Manager for Healthpact (ACT Health Promotion Grants) 2003 – 2006;  as well as managing funded arts projects and working in a voluntary capacities with a number of ACT and national arts organizations.   She served as Chair of the ACT Community Arts Peer Assessment Committee 2000 – 2003 and Deputy Chair of the ACT Cultural Council from 2001 – 2003. 

Ms Margie Rowe

Margie Rowe has been a practising lawyer for over 20 years in both government law and private practice. She has been teaching law at the ANU College of Law for the past 7 years. Margie has been on the Board of the Conflict Resolution Service, on school boards, on the Board of the Women's Legal Centre ACT & Region for 10 years and is a past Chair of the ACT's Domestic Violence Prevention Council. Margie is a long time Canberra resident and  moved to Belconnen 2 years ago. She has 3 children attending school in Belconnen.

Ex officio:
Ms Hannah Semler (Director & Public Officer)