Vaughn Arambatzis, a 15-year-old Greek-Australian that has made waves with his commitment to recycling and the Sydney Dogs and Cats Home, has been bestowed a massive honour of being named one of Georges River Council’s Young Citizens of the Year.
The honour is part of the Australia Day celebrations and recognises the youngster’s dedication to recycling drink containers and cashing it in through NSW’s Return and Earn scheme, with the funds all going towards the charity pound, Sydney Dogs and Cats Home.
Vaughn (Βάιος in Greek) started this project back in 2020 during the pandemic, which has seen him so far help contribute to the recycling of approximately 35,000 drink containers and (at 10 cents a container) roughly raise $3,500 for Sydney Dogs and Cats Home.
Barbara Arambatzis, his mother who hails from Astypalaia, said they found out in early December he would receive this honour, adding to his previous ‘Keep Australia Beautiful’ (NSW) ‘Young Legend’s Award’ win and being named Community Champion for Georges River Council (both in 2022).
Mrs Arambatzis said that their local Blakehurst Ward Councillor, Natalie Mort, played a key role in this.
“(Natalie Mort) has kept close tabs on Vaughn’s progress over the years and she endorsed him for Young Citizen of the Year. She said that she couldn’t think of a more deserving young person,” Mrs Arambatzis told Neos Kosmos.
“My husband and I are very proud of Vaughn for continuing with his project and also of his sister Eleni (13), who helps him so much. It is nice to see kids not only being aware of social issues but also working towards solutions.”
The inspiration behind this project of Vaughn’s stems back to when his family adopted a dog, which they named Kanela (Cinnamon in Greek), from Sydney Dogs and Cats Home in 2018.
They unfortunately had to give it back to the shelter and Vaughn was immensely pleased to hear they strive to re-home them, and only euthanising pets if absolutely necessary.
Since 2020, as the result of initially fulfilling a school initiative, the St Patricks College student has actively involved himself in recycling to support both Sydney Dogs and Cats Home with donations and his commitment to protecting the environment.
The process has become a lot easier than when he first started, no longer having to bag the containers and drive to the recycler with his uncle to deposit them due to the involvement of Purple Bins.
The service involves dropping off purple-coloured bins specifically for the purpose of collecting recyclables that are part of the 10c Return and Earn scheme, picking them up when they are full and then replacing them with an empty one.
This has drastically simplified the process for Vaughn, who in 2022 successfully applied with his parents for a Georges River Council MicroGrant to obtain five additional Purple bins.
He keeps three of them in the front yard of his Connells Point home for his neighbours to use, and two outside the local gyms of ‘The Lift Department’ at Bexley in Bayside Council and ‘F45 Blakehurst’ in Georges River Council.
Mrs Arambatzis explained that all this has significantly reduced the number of hours he has to personally invest for this, which is ideal as he enters Year 10 and very soon his HSC years.
“He doesn’t need to put many hours towards the project like he used to, so his efforts are focused on raising awareness via social media and local Council,” she said.
Building on this point, Mrs Arambatzis elaborated that their wish is to see more people engage in whatever charitable causes they feel passionate about.
“Sydney Dogs and Cats Home is Sydney’s only charity pound and it offers a very important service but in saying that, every charity is important. Recycling is a very simple act and our family, would like to see more people use Return and Earn to help their local community at the grassroots,” she said.
“Vaughn says that he would like to see other young people do what he is doing to help charities or organisations that are important to them.”
