Senior communications consultant Rebecca Raap has brought home the 2009 National Award for Planning Excellence from the recent Planning Institute of Australia (PIA) Awards in Darwin.

Rebecca, currently a key member of the community relations team for the Victoria Road bus priority project, was part of the team that received the award for ‘Social and Community Based Planning’.

Rebecca led a team of consultants on a very complex community consultation project for the Chief Minister's Office into the preferred future use of eight former school sites, closed in 2006 by the ACT Government.

The project subsequently won the 2008 ACT divisional Awards for Planning Excellence and then went on to win this year’s national award.

The award is given for a ‘policy, scheme, project or report that demonstrates how social issues, social justice, and community participation are integral to sound urban, regional and / or rural planning’.

The judges said the Community Sites Consultation project demonstrated ‘a most effective consultation process dealing with one of the most challenging issues facing many cities: the closure of schools. It was politically and emotionally charged, but was successfully navigated through a combination of excellent consultation process and skilled political management’.

Congratulations, Rebecca!