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Porirua has been short-listed for the World’s Most Livable City by the United Nations. It’s innovative initiatives like this one that keep Porirua on track to securing a better future. Good on you Porirua – you’re one cool little city!!

Porirua’s Water Guy is Austin Roberts and since April this year he has been on a mission to bring water savings to each and every household in the city. He shows residents how to fix dripping outside taps and can talk them through fixing leaking indoor taps and toilet cisterns, leaving a brochure (and sometimes a washer or two) so they can do future simple repairs for themselves. And if a brochure and a chat with Austin isn’t enough to get people on track with those water savings, now there are great little online videos.

According to Porirua City Council staff, their Water Guy has brought yearly water savings to the city of around three million litres – just from the leaks he has located and repaired. Add to that significant power savings for residents who have had their hot water leaks fixed.

Stop the drip

Securing Porirua’s status as one of the most livable cities is about cementing some pretty critical mindshifts. With our Water Guy, we’re shifting the way we think about and use water – household by household, street by street. And business by business too, I hope. When the whole community gets thinking about easy ways to save water and taking care what goes down our drains, we take enormous pressure off waste and stormwater systems, we make water more affordable, and we enhance the health of our waterways – We all win!

You can find these videos and lots more on Porirua City Council’s website – check it out and spread the word: http://www.pcc.govt.nz/News—Events/Latest-News/Help-Save-Water

And you can also see Austin fixing those leaks right here…

Here’s some background to Porirua’s place on the UN livable communities shortlist. The winner will be known by November 8, 2010. Launched in 1997, the LivCom Awards are endorsed by the United Nations Environment Programme or UNEP, seeking out best practice in managing the local environment. The LivCom mission is: to improve the quality of life of individual citizens through the creation of ‘liveable communities’. LivCom is non-political and embraces all nations and cultures. More than 50 countries are represented within this year’s awards in Chicago. From November 4 to 8 you can be there – go to the ‘world’s most livable city’ link at the top of the page to see live streaming of the awards.