Vale Peter Reid OAM BREAZE Treasurer 2013 - 2021

Ian Rossiter past President and Current Chair of the Breaze Public Fund on Peter Reid’s Involvement with Breaze and the community

 
I first met Peter in 1996 when the City of Ballarat was handed responsibility to manage the Ballarat Begonia Festival after the Ballarat Begonia Festival Association became insolvent. We sought expressions of interest for Council’s Begonia Festival Special Committee. Peter applied and immediately became an involved member having vast experience on management committees and his passion for events being run by Council to be inclusive and his passion for social equity.
Peter being a pragmatist with a need for evidence-based decision making was quickly able to challenge those who were steeped in tradition and this is the way things must be done. We faced some massive financial and human resource challenges and Peter’s sound project management skills helped identify what was achievable and what commitment from outside organisations would be needed to deliver major events.
Peter’s passion to see soccer flourish for juniors saw him holding executive roles in the Ballarat and District Soccer Assn and I enjoyed his negotiating ability to make sure training and match play opportunities were provided by Council when the Australian Rules and Regional Soccer Clubs tried their best to monopolise grass and synthetic playing surfaces. Peter was instrumental in the development of the Ballarat Regional Soccer Facility at Morsehead Park and again his respectful but straight forward manner kept Project Control Group meetings focused on delivery and access for all ages and talent levels.
When I invited Peter to join the Ballarat Renewable Energy and Zero Emissions Inc Board he was immediately involved in planning ways to educate the community on the need for action on climate change, how to generate some income to sustain the organisation and some potential projects that would show how the community can work with all levels of government and industry to make a difference.
Peter and I determined that BREAZE would be bankrupt fairly quickly if it solely relied on membership fees, donations and grants from government. We seized the opportunity to run the Ballarat Farmers market as it could generate regular income and provide a platform for community engagement. Peter developed all the spreadsheets, cash handling procedures and devoted 3 years of twice monthly meetings with a paid market coordinator to ensure the event was well attended and the goods and services provided were ethically matched to our goals.
Peter committed significant time to a number of government- funded regional initiatives that BREAZE delivered including the Community Power Hub, New Energy Jobs Initiative and Grampians Renewable Energy Program. This is where Peter’s engineering and project management expertise shone as business cases needed to be developed for projects including medium scale solar, biomass heating and integrated solar and bioenergy alternatives for rural communities were investigated.
While all this was going on Peter maintained his commitment to Damascus College’s Energy Breakthrough Challenge Team. Peter provided engineering advice on how to build electric lightweight vehicles for the students to build to compete annually in Maryborough. He religiously attended the events and ensured the lessons learned each year would feed back in the following year’s team planning and vehicle development. 

Peter’s experience in trade unions led him to become involved in the Cooperative Power (CoPower) enterprise in which the union movement founded its own electricity retailer and all profits were distributed to worthy organisations promoting environmental sustainability.
I’m sure others are aware of his involvement with many other important causes.