Nominations are open for the City of Fremantle's Sealin Garlett Community Leadership Award.
The award honours the late Reverend Sealin Garlett, who was an outstanding contributor towards reconciliation both to the Nyoongar community and non-Aboriginal community of Perth.
The City of Fremantle created the award in collaboration with the Walyalup Reconciliation Action Plan Working Group to celebrate the achievements of a community member who has demonstrated outstanding contributions in reconciliation and community leadership.
To be eligible for the Sealin Garlett Award, the person nominated must be of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent; connected to the City of Fremantle by volunteering, residing, working or studying within the City; and have demonstrated achievements in community leadership and reconciliation. People cannot nominate themselves.
The award winner will be announced as part of the City's NAIDOC Week celebrations being held from Sunday 4 to Sunday 11 July 2021.
Respected Nyoongar Elder, the late Marie Thorne, was the winner of last year's inaugural Sealin Garlett Award for Community Leadership.
She was a resident of Hilton for around 30 years, raising seven children of her own and fostering 12 others.
She was a leader of the Fremantle Indigenous Action Group, spreading her knowledge of Aboriginal sites and issues to non-indigenous people since 1998, and was also successful in her campaign to rename Booyeembara Park with its Nyoongar name.
She was a published writer, creating poetry that showed her ties to her Nyoongar roots and won the Fremantle Heritage Award for an individual after working tirelessly within her community, securing emergency accommodation and safe shelter for the homeless, and for other vulnerable people.
Nominations for the 2021 Sealin Garlett Community Leadership Award close at 4pm, 31 May 2021.
