Greg Vann,
Queensland Walks President
Walking is fundamental in everything we do. It enables us to get around and visit and create connections. It underpins how our communities and economy operate. As the peak advocacy for walking, we’re delighted that we have been able to expand our resources with the addition of more great staff to support our wonderful Executive Officer, Anna Campbell.
We warmly welcomed Tanya Smith who recently took on the role of Project Manager for Walkshops and Community Advocacy. Tanya has an extensive background in not-for-profit, community, and local and state government, with experience in planning and community engagement. Tanya joined Queensland Walks at the Zillmere Community Centre Safe Cities Safe Streets nighttime walking event in 2024 with Zonta and University of Queensland, and she’s proving to be a valuable addition to our organisation. On a personal note, I have known Tanya for many years and am delighted to have her on board.
Stevie Smiles has been building our Walkshops and weWALK and Safe Cities | Safe Streets for Women and Girls content on the website as well as a really neat Safe Cities toolkit, and organisational brand and assets. Stevie was responsible for our logo change, video and image content and Queensland Walks Month campaigns. If you haven’t seen our videos ‘How are you Travelling’ and ‘See it From the Other Side’, you must!
We also welcomed Dawn Carnell who is helping us with payroll, administration and processes. Dawn works with Outdoors Queensland and has seamlessly joined the team. Welcome Dawn!
Anna Campbell continues in the role as Executive Officer managing our small and passionate team, leading our strong advocacy, ensuring that our funded projects of the Queensland Walking Alliance, Walkshops and WeWalk projects are delivered and working with our talented volunteer board to make sure we’re on track with our strategy.
Walking helps us to see the bigger picture — and sometimes, the tiniest details. I suspect that there will be many more walking meetings ahead of us as we get closer to the 2032 Games and we hope you’ll be on that journey with us! More walking, rolling and strolling more often benefits everyone.
Don’t forget our Jane’s Walk events coming up in May, kickstarted by a Suncorp Stadium walk on 1 May.
And stay tuned for more updates on what we’ll be doing with our expanded capacity!