City of Moreton Bay triumphs at GovHack awards

Published 19 December 2023

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Nine City of Moreton Bay teams were honoured at the 2023 GovHack International Red Carpet Awards.

Hosted by City of Moreton Bay, the awards acknowledged these teams among 1,500 participants who used open data from government sources to develop 191 projects, addressing 42 real-world challenges.

City of Moreton Bay Mayor Peter Flannery said it was incredible to see the city’s innovation at work in this highly respected open-data challenge, and to see the awards celebrated in the local area.

“Events like this build innovative and entrepreneurial skills in our young people and encourage them to look at opportunities to solve local and national issues with data and a creative lens.

“The achievements of our local winners, and City of Moreton Bay being awarded the Best Government Participation award, demonstrate that City of Moreton Bay is serious about its role as a knowledge and innovation hub of South East Queensland,” said Mayor Flannery.

Dr Erica Mealy, Program Coordinator of Computer Science at UniSC, said GovHack was an incredible platform for innovative thinkers, data scientists and programmers to work with open data to solve real-world problems in a collaborative and fun challenge.

“Big data is a growth industry with huge future applications – so this event is perfect for putting students at the forefront by learning the power of data and the importance of using it responsibly,” Dr Mealy said.

“It was wonderful to host such a high-profile international award ceremony at UniSC’s Moreton Bay campus and to be able to recognise the local talent and winners.”

City of Moreton Bay was also awarded ‘Best Government Participation - Local Government’ for the second time, recognising the organisation’s work in supplying more than one million records onto the datahub, and supporting the event.

The 2023 GovHack International Red Carpet Awards were attended by teams from across Australia including Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney, and Albany, and was live streamed nationally.

2023 GovHack International Red Carpet Award winners from Moreton Bay:

State awards

Moreton Bay resilient in times of uncertainty:

  • Winner: Hazmap by Team Cheese, in the City of Moreton Bay sponsored challenge

Moreton Bay greening as we grow:

  • Runner up: Invasive species detection application by The Invasives
  • Honourable mention: Streamline by Eclipse
  • Honourable mention: Tracking flying foxes by Delta Force

Driving a better way forward:

  • Winner: Project RAPID by Drop Bears (Grace Lutheran College students)
  • Honourable mention: ServiSync by the Odometer Operators
  • Honourable mention: Reducing vehicle idling time - A better way towards carbon neutral by Fantastic Five

National and International Awards

Measuring and reducing carbon emissions from physical infrastructure assets:

  • Runner up: Project RAPID by Drop bears (Grace Lutheran College students)
  • Honourable mention: Gaia by Gaia

Best creative use of data in response to Environment and Sustainability Strategy:

  • Honourable mention: Reducing vehicle idling time - A better way towards carbon neutral by Fantastic Five

Best Government Participation - Local Council

  • Winner: City of Moreton Bay

Spirit of GovHack award

  • Winner: Ash Khan 
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Tom, Jacob, Daniel, and Jamie from Team Cheese, Queensland winner for project Hazmap - Moreton Bay resilient in times of uncertainty challenge and Councillor Karl Winchester from City of Moreton Bay.

Councillor Karl Winchester accepts City of Moreton Bay’s award for Best Government Participation - Local Council.png

Councillor Karl Winchester accepts City of Moreton Bay’s award for Best Government Participation - Local Council