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Walking Together

Action Groups

Starting Strong Together

Our Schools:

Our Community

Acceptance and Healing

Coming Together,

Restoring Respect

What are Action Groups?

Grounded in relationships, shared decision-making and respect for all voices, LTM Action Groups are a collective of voices who guide work that strengthens connection, opportunity and belonging. Their work is place-based, inclusive and culturally safe, which aims to influence systems and decisions so positive change can be sustained over time.

Who is involved?

First Meeting

In the third week of March, we brought together organisations, service providers, and partners for the first round of Action Group meetings, strengthening collaboration across the Macleay Valley.

Participants highlighted the importance of open dialogue and collective action, with one sharing,

“The start of healing is telling.”

In these initial conversations, several common themes emerged across all four Action Groups. While each group explored different focus areas, there was strong agreement on a number of key challenges and opportunities for change.

One message came through clearly: the challenge isn't a lack of services, but how well they're connected. When services operate in silos, it can lead to duplication, gaps in support and make it harder for families to navigate the system.

Conversations also highlighted the importance of community leadership, cultural authority and Connection to Country.

Participants shared that meaningful systems change takes time and must be built on trust, relationships and a culturally grounded approach.

Rather than creating new services, our focus is on strengthening the connections between the people, organisations and services already doing great work. Together, we're working towards a more connected system centred on shared outcomes and community voice.

As we move into Meeting 2, members will revisit the commitments they've made, identify priorities for each outcome and continue shaping practical actions that will help drive long-term change.

Second Meeting

With the connections and shared understanding built in our first meeting, we came together again on 01- 02 July to take the next step:

Exploring what needs to change and what we can do differently, together, across the Macleay Valley.

We built on the gaps, challenges and opportunities identified in Meeting 1, bringing together different perspectives, knowledge and expertise to deepen our understanding of what is happening across the system.

We also looked beyond individual services and organisations, exploring how we can strengthen our collective capacity by building on the knowledge, relationships and connections already within our community.

From these conversations, we began shaping collective actions for change. Several key ideas emerged as important areas to explore:

  • Stronger service mapping, to better understand what exists across the Macleay Valley and where connections, gaps and opportunities lie.
  • Earlier prevention and support, focusing on ways we can respond earlier and support people before challenges become more difficult to address.
  • Community voice, lived experience and co-design, ensuring the people most affected are part of shaping the solutions.
  • Cultural safety, recognising it as central to the way we work with and for our community.
  • Evaluation and learning, including setting timeframes and creating opportunities to test, learn and adapt along the way.

These conversations helped us move from understanding the challenges towards thinking about what we can collectively do about them.

What’s next?

In Meeting 3, we’ll take the next step:

Turning these ideas into action. Together, we’ll begin designing a practical plan around the priorities that have emerged through the Action Groups and consider how we can test, learn and work towards meaningful, long-term change.