Welcome to Country

Nagganbi.
Welcome to Country
Traditionally, this Country all-encompassing of sea, rivers, creeks, land, and skies were cared for and occupied by the Wanngal Clan. More broadly by the multiple clans of Coastal Sydney whom I am a descendant of. My people moved about following fishing seasons in this very Bay, the neighbouring harbours, and all surrounding rivers.  
 
It is important to acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of Bays West, the Wanngal clan. We acknowledge their kinship, trade, moiety, and connections to the broader landscape of Coastal Sydney. The connectivity and intricate webs of environmental knowledge, the cultural systems and ancient knowledges and stories that governed interactions with people, place, and environment.  
 
We acknowledge the Ancestors, Elders past and present and their continuous connections to Country and culture. We acknowledge their resilience and strength and pay tribute to the Elders who role modelled self- determination and a continuation of cultural pride. When we acknowledge Country, we acknowledge that culturally its definition is all encompassing of the land, water, skies, rivers, creeks, and our Ancestors.  
 
The surrounding rock shelters, springs and remnants of our campsites and prominent natural features within the landscape are a tangible reminder of the ancientness of this place and the people who come from it. Most of all, our Ancestral beings who shaped and formed it. We still proudly continue to live on our Country and care for it. We will always be connected to this place. We will always have a cultural responsibility to this place and each other. We assert our cultural philosophies that it is Country that sustains us and on behalf of our Ancestors, the knowledges passed down to us and the bloodlines within us, we Welcome you to this place. This land is, always was and always will be – Aboriginal Land.  
 

Rowena Welsh-Jarrett  
Descendant of multiple Sydney Clan groups 
Dharawal and Gumbayngirr woman. 
 

Our approach at White Bay
White Bay Power Station, at the heart of Bays West represents a transformative opportunity within Sydney’s iconic inner harbour. It is an urban renewal project of regional impact and global significance leveraging the government’s strategic investment in Sydney Metro West. The first example of Country-led regeneration at this scale in Australia and a vanguard for a new form of Sydney urbanism. 
 
Placemaking NSW is working with First Nation’s representatives Rowena Welsh Jarrett (Dharawal and Gumbaynggirr), Emily McDaniel (Wiradjuri) and Alison Page (Dharawal and Yuin). The elevation of First Nations voices in the process will ensure meaningul integration of Country centred principles at White Bay Power Station.