It is my pleasure to report on a wide variety of activities and achievements for St Albans.

A large part of the job is the administration tied to running this St Albans Community Resource Centre – it is a much-loved and well-used facility. The CCC has done well in preserving this semi-historic building and recent expenditure on replacing window frames and internal maintenance shows that the CCC is committed to retaining this facility for the local community. People like the atmosphere and usage figures are continually increasing.

A drawback of the facility is that it only has one main room for hiring out and because we believe in a philosophy of providing this facility at community rates (which is endorsed by CCC) the potential income is limited which in turn limits the potential of full self-sufficiency. This brings with it the ever-present need for extra fund raising for staff. But so far we have been lucky to retain Marilyn who is a wonderful mainstay of this popular facility. We have been promoting the Centre for private functions on Saturday evenings and this is starting to bring in more revenue.

The challenge this year has been to try to persuade the CCC that we really do have a parking problem. Repeated Annual Plan submissions and lobbying of local Councilors and the Community Board has resulted in the Property Unit having been assigned to do a Needs Analysis Report. The result of a recent survey showed 89% agreed or agreed strongly that parking was very difficult. Hopefully, results like this will persuade the Council to address this one lack in this facility.

Events - We have had a quiet year as regards events. The successful Art @ Abberley event last February was our quota from a Council funding point of view for a while, but we’ll be looking at organizing another event again next year.

We have established a very good partnership with St Matthews Church, with the original Classical Community Concert last September being an event combined-ly organized with St Matthews Church following that up with a Christmas and then an Easter concert. All very enjoyable and successful.

Community Development – existing groups such as the St Albans Choir, Art Society, History group, Scrabble group and walkers group continue to enjoy their activities in this local facility.

A new initiative we have concentrated on this year is providing interesting talks for senior citizens at retirement villages. The aim being to bring people here for some networking and socializing. The talks ranged from Gordon Ogilvie’s 'Enjoyment of the Port Hills" to a talk on Judaism by Batzia Susskind. These have been a great success with people asking when we are going to hold the next series of talks.

The Centre has been affiliated with Hagley Community College for some years now, which helps us to provide low cost adult education courses. This has been very successful in that we offer courses ranging from computing to art and this term, besides the regular computer courses, we will be offering Floral Art and Paper Mache. With the help of a volunteer we have also successfully started a little ESOL class, which will hopefully start a domino effect and address some of the issues migrants and refugees have to deal with when they arrive in a new country.

For the past months we have been in the process of setting up a community café. A dedicated group of ladies has been treating us to a wonderful selection of baking and cappuccinos every Thursday morning as they practice for the opening of this café. Our waistlines and those of the NeighbourNet volunteers are steadily increasing with this weekly treat! Shaughn Briggs, a local artist, has donated his time in designing the logo, while Aaron, from Signing On, has made the sandwich board in exchange for cake and coffee. A wonderful contribution from locals, which will hopefully be a sign that this community café will become a success. We are planning to open next month.

Youth work – SARA continues to be blessed with funding from Lotteries for the employment of a Youth Worker. SARA contracts Katrina Hill, who has been a great addition to our team. The continuing provision of youth holiday programmes is meeting an identified need for low cost holiday entertainment with grateful parents enthusing about the high quality of our activities. We have found that the holiday programmes are better attended than any term-time activities, so we concentrate on providing a cheap and excitingly varied programme. Judging by the high attendance yet again of our September programme, we’re doing something right.

Neighbour Net Computing Room – is going from strength to strength. We now have 15 volunteers, which has resulted in a tripling of our opening hours with customer numbers increasing steadily. This year we have successfully received grants for two new computers and a new ergonomic bench which will better streamline the room.

We have focused one evening on networked games for youth, with a Kidsfest activity offering the same thing. This has all been very successful. Occasionally we rent out the room to groups such as the genealogy group. We would like to develop more of this type of networking.

The webpage is up, but the time required in maintaining a site like this is prohibitive for volunteers. However, we’re looking at software options like php, which streamline information with automatic dates coming on or falling off.

Council Issues – We continue to be the link between Council and residents by offering public meetings on such issues as local Resource Consents, CCC Annual Plans, Orion site, infill housing and local traffic issues such as the NROSS Report, Cranford St widening and the proposed bus route improvements.

I also represent SARA on behalf of the community on the Management Committee of English Park.

We hope to retain the Edgeware Pool facilities for as long as possible, but as maintenance costs increase, in future, this may become a difficult expense to justify as the CCC concentrates on providing the alternative indoor pool complexes.

Community Liaison – the SACRC and SARA are in constant liaison with different groups in the community – community groups, churches, businesses, the local schools, individuals and the Community Board. We provide advice, advocacy, help with funding applications and fight for local issues using STANN as the vehicle for information dissemination. Successful funding applications prove the support of the local funding providers such as – Community Development Scheme, Community Board, Lotteries, Creative Communities, The Community Trust, Hagley Community College and Pub Charities. Without their combined support we would not be able to provide the diverse activities or enjoy the improved facilities and assets for the community.

To ensure the continued survival of STANN and share the responsibilities and workload somewhat SARA has agreed to incorporate STANN under its umbrella organisation. This seems a logical step to take and legal issues such as potential for defamation liability has been resolved with advice from the Community Law Centre. At present SARA is also supervising a proposed Ace-scheme to develop a community booklet on how to set up a newspaper like STANN, so that other suburbs can start up similar vehicles for the dissemination of community information.

My thanks to the SARA Management Committee, especially Maggy Tai Rakena, for their continued unstinting support for my sometimes wild ideas; all the volunteers of the NeighbourNet room, The Papanui Shirley Community Board, especially Councilor Megan Evans who always seems to be our first port of call – and last but definitely not least to Marilyn – my right hand support person who holds the fort so ably and cheerfully during my presence and my absences alike - thank you all.

Douceline Wardle

Community Facilitator for St Albans