Familiar Face: Sue Britt

Sue Britt is a very familiar face in the Halswell community because she has lived here for twenty years but also because of her public performances as the ever patient assistant of Elgregoe aka Greg Britt, Sue's husband. Sue and Greg are recognised as two of New Zealand's top school show performers and spend most of their time delivering a 'You've Got the Power' message that has been seen by over 850, 000 students and reaches an estimated twenty percent of New Zealand Year 1-8 students every year. Combined in their show are tricks, ventriloquism, puppets, parrots, songs, poems, amazing illusion and audience participation making a fast and fun show. Their passion is not just to perform great shows but to challenge students about how they treat others at school. The traffic theme this year, taught students "to STOP bullying, to SLOW down and think about what they can say and to go and be the student that can make a difference."

A born and bred Cantabrian, Sue went to St Martins Primary and Cashmere High. Sports and creative classes such as cooking and sewing caught Sue's interest, rather than traditional academic subjects. On leaving school, Sue enjoyed working as a receptionist for an accounting firm. Life took a different turn when she met Greg through a youth group and they married. Sue's life became focused on raising their children and working part-time. Once her children were independent, Sue began touring with her husband, entertaining children throughout New Zealand.

The El Gregoe show evolved gradually. Greg's passion for magic led to the opening of a magic shop in the Shades Arcade and then in Colombo St for fifteen years. However, stiff competition from outlets such as the $2 shops, The Warehouse and the internet began to make the business uneconomic and sadly, they had to close the store. However, sometimes great things come from the most difficult of circumstances, and the magic shows were born with a timely request from a Halswell school principal at the time. He asked Greg if he could bring some magic with a message addressing bullying issues and the show was so well received, other schools started requesting a visit. Greg then, went to Australia to spend time with Clifford Warne's Television presenter and author of many books on communicating with an audience, in order to develop routines that would work with an anti-bullying theme.

The Elgregoe school show has been very busy ever since travelling up and down the country delivering the much needed message that Bullying isn't cool, and You've Got the Power to Make a Difference. It has been a very rewarding experience as Sue and Greg meet adults in the malls who recite the earlier slogans such as It's cool to care, from shows they had seen in their school days. Sue says that in recent years, schools are seeing the importance of teaching key values, building good relationships and encouraging students to make a positive contribution at school. Responsible, Respect, Courage, Integrity, and Acceptance, are key words of the show. Sue loves that they are teaching life skills and giving people tools to combat bullying. Touring the poorer areas, tugs on her heartstrings; the places were there is not enough money for children's lunches or shoes. However, seeing many parts of New Zealand, has also been an interesting, as Sue suggests she wouldn't have got to visit them otherwise.

Despite all the travelling, the Britts have managed to grow a close family. Sue describes herself as "fairly family minded" adding that they "modelled their family on other families they had observed around them." Their three children, are friends but give each other space too. Interestedly, a public life working with children, has been embraced by Sue and Greg's children as they have all, in their own ways followed in their footsteps. Melanie, pursued a career in early childhood. Nicholas worked with his dad for four years and has now carved out his own career as a magician on the Sunshine Coast and Tash is a 24/7 worker in local schools and is in charge of the children and youth's Sunday School programme at South West Baptist Church. Melanie and her husband Sam have just had their first baby, Nicholas and his wife Jess have three children and Tash is about to get married to Curtis from Wales who is working on the rebuild downtown.

At the moment, the Britts are also in the midst of designing and practising a new show for the new year, in order to begin a whole new round of touring. Balancing grand parenting, wedding planning, tour planning and performing, Sue finds peace when walking and gardening. The tranquil surroundings of Halswell, are also a welcome tonic. Sue and Greg together, have created a very happy family life, while at the same time have been delivering a great proactive message to huge numbers of New Zealand children. These are both pretty impressive achievements.

Halswell Creative Talent

There are many creative people in our Halswell Community doing work that they enjoy wholeheartedly.  This month,  the Halswell Newsletter interviewed four of them.

Nick Hawes and Pauline Dellow of Cats in Your Face

Nick and Pauline are fairly surprised by the creative hobby they have begun in the last year or so as they are also rather busy with their graphic design business, Yellow Pencil.
Painting brightly coloured terracotta pots with vivacious looking black and white cats, had a surprising beginning: from volunteer fundraising for the Westpac Rescue Helicopter at local rural A and P shows. The pair had enjoyed working there so much that when it was over they began to wonder what they could do at a regular market.  After some thought, they decided to combine Pauline's love of painting, Nick’s graphic design skills and their mutual love of cats. It's a concept that is working as they are selling well, and the couple have enjoyed seeing faces light up as they head over to their stall. Many have suggested that they could develop their hobby into a business. However, the last thing they want is “for it to turn into another busy job."  The Halswell Market has been their home and they love meeting customers but also the regular community developing around the market.  "You get to catch up with everyone once a month without all the trouble of organising dinner parties," says Nick cheekily.  Having been married for 38 years, with  kids grown and left home; their newfound hobby has also been something nice to do together.

If you would like to see Cats in Your Face products, you can find them at the Halswell Market, which is every fourth Sunday in the St John of God gardens 12 - 3pm. If you wish to contact Nick and Pauline, see their Facebook page or website www.catsinyourface.co.nz


Paul Harding Browne of No Boundaries Furniture

 As is often the case with creative people,  Paul's interest in all things woodworking began as a child.  He grew up in a family that didn't watch television.  " We were always busy building something."  His father's reply to the question " Can we buy a...?"  was always "Let's see if we can make it. "    Paul began making projects at the age of eight or nine and   one of his first pieces was a "funky round TV cabinet."  People's first reactions were "You're mad."  "Why are you making something so complicated?" and   "Why don't you just make it a square?" However, orders eventually began to come in from family and friends for cots, tables, bedroom furniture, bookshelves and wall units.  Realising that he liked new creative challenges, he set up a custom made furniture business ten years ago. 

No Boundaries Furniture creates any piece of furniture in a wood and metal combination, but primarily with wood. Teaming up with local upholsterer, Brian Roper of WPS Upholstery, Paul  is able to  fulfil client  requests for designs that require cushions and upholstery.  Paul loves to fulfil client expectations because "they have often found a design that they are really excited about." Furthermore,  "bringing life to an old piece of furniture is also very rewarding." Other aspects of the business are in-house cabinetry,  furniture alterations and designer furniture.  Not wanting to waste the beautiful wood offcuts lying around the workshop, Paul has created several artistic  pieces of furniture. For a more in-depth look at Paul's work please go to

www.noboundariesfurniture.co.nz




Lynette Brass of Wedding Flowers by Lynette

Floristy was an early “calling” for Lynette as she had made up her mind that she wanted to be a florist at the early age of five. She also  recalls getting in trouble after school because she had  collected bunches of flowers from people's gardens  on the way home.  In a similar way, the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana revealed an early interest. Lynette can remember  everyone was talking about the dress, except for  her because she couldn't wait to see the bridal bouquet!

On leaving school, Lynette worked in an Interfloral flower shop and trained as a florist. About the same time, she began to arrange  bridal flowers for  weddings of friends and relatives, and has continued to do this for the past 25 years. Lynette also works part-time in the dental health department of the CDHB. It wasn't until  2012 that she began Wedding Flowers by Lynette and formalised what she had already been doing for many years.

Lynette's business has taken off and is hectic during  the wedding months. Regular posts on Facebook  and her website show beautiful attention to detail in an array of various flowers and styles. Clearly evident is Lynette's pride and joy  in her work, shown through the quality of her arrangements and the beautiful photographs that she takes or posts. Going beyond what the client expects in  creative ways is also an a part of Lynette's business style  and something that she really enjoys doing.   In her spare time, Lynette can be found in her garden, or studying the floral fashions of Europe and celebrity weddings.

To find Wedding Flowers by Lynette go to www.christchurchweddingflowers.co.nz

A Familiar Place:St John of God, Halswell

In our local area, we have an organisation that embraces fully the concept of community.  St John of God Halswell is operated by St John of God Hauroa Trust.  It is a Catholic organisation whose core values are hospitality, compassion, respect, justice and excellence which reflect the life of their founder St John of God.

Sixty residents are living on site, 24 more are supported in the community and there are approximately 40 outpatients per month.  About one-third of the residents are undergoing rehab and therapy before returning home or to a supported living arrangement.  Originally, it was a hospital but in recent years, there is far greater focus on creating an active and social lifestyle for the residents who are living with a physical disability or an injury as a result of an accident or neurological condition. 

The original hospital was replaced in 1999 with a modern building designed and equipped to meet the needs of the residents.  As you walk in, you are greeted by friendly, happy staff and spacious, light surroundings.  The beautiful gardens also make this an attractive place to live. 

The founding principles declare that St John of God would be an organisation that looks after its residents and also its staff well.  There's a commendable low turnover rate amongst the 150 staff and some have worked there for over 30 years.  One such example is Brendan Kubala, who as head grounds-person, is known for his diligence in his care of the award-winning gardens. 

The gardens and the space at St John of God Halswell have proved very useful in developing community relationships.  Traditionally, the organisation had always been proactive in getting its residents active through sport, recreation, bowling, arts and crafts, shopping trips and meeting friends for coffee.  However, Virginia Spoors, the Regional Manager of Health and Ability Services, St John of God Hauora Trust, explains that in 2013 the service introduced a model of care “My Life”.  Traditionally the service had a very medical focus but the“model of care now incorporates a much more social focus and involves not only ensuring that residents are interacting with the community but that the community is interacting with us.”  Since then, several new projects have developed.

Photo:  Regional Manager Virginia Spoors and  Community  Liaison  Officer Vicky Taylor

The first was "Carols by Treelight", which started four years ago and is an event that is getting bigger every year.  Next came the Halswell Menzshed, which is a meeting of retired and semi-retired men in St John of God's workshop”.  "It's a symbiotic relationship", comments Virginia. “The Menzshed meets in our facilities, and they help the residents with their own projects."  The next initiative was prompted by a request from the Halswell Community Project who wanted to know if St John of God would be interested in hosting a market once a month.  St John of God agreed that this would be great for the residents and the market has been well attended by residents, residents' families and the general public. Another more recent community based initiative is "Project Grow", which will be the creation of a community garden with the Rowley Community Centre.

The new model of care is interestingly illustrated by a piece of framed toast above Virginia’s desk.  When questioned she explained that it symbolised the creativity and problem solving that the model incorporates.  We have moved from a “cold toast model of care to a hot toast model of care”.  Staff work hard at ensuring people’s individual needs are met including when and how they would like their toast.

The mission statement for St John of God, Halswell is "To create an environment where people living with a disability are creating opportunities to live and participate in life”.  This is not just some glossy brochure spin.  At St John of God, they are clearly "walking the talk".

Familiar Faces:Lesley Parker's Halswell Community Choir and Friends

The first time I heard Lesley Parker's Halswell Community Choir and invited musicians was at one of their earlier concerts in the Halswell hall a few years ago. They made a big impression with the choir doing a fabulous job of singing upbeat songs, sometimes in five part harmonies which the audience sang along to. Afterwards, the musicians jumped on stage to belt out dance numbers and the hall erupted with the whole audience jumping to their feet and dancing for the rest of the evening. We had enjoyed the night so much that naturally when Halswell Community Project were trying to think of another community event to hold, we thought of Lesley and her friends and thought a Halswell winter dance would be fun. And yes, it was, it turned out to be another great night where the crowd danced all night long to perfectly pitched cover songs.

The Halswell Community Choir are often seen at local events and the thing that strikes you about the choir, apart from their lovely tunes, is the joy that is on their faces. They are loving every minute of what they are doing, and with the self-deprecating humour of their Irish director, as well as a mix of other musicians, it makes them a very entertaining bunch.

All this musical talent came to Halswell, not long after Lesley and her husband Matt arrived here from the UK. It was then that Lesley started the choir. Lesley had grown up in Northern Ireland and Matt, London. Music is a big part of their lives, however, they also have day jobs. Lesley works as a science teacher at Westmount school. Matt used to work for the city council but is now a pastor of Kings Church in the city. Kings Church is part of a worldwide family of churches called New Frontiers which is involved with church planting. There are New Frontier Churches here in Christchurch and also in Wellington, Auckland, New Plymouth and Nelson. Many of Lesley's fellow musicians attend this church too.

Matt and Lesley both came from homes where there was a love of singing. Matt's dad even joins the choir when he comes over from London to visit. Lesley's family attended the Quaker church, which ironically, worships in silence. Her parents could both hold a tune well and everywhere she went, Lesley joined a choir or worship band. Matt obtained a degree in Music at the Royal Academy of Music in London and plays the bassoon, amongst many other instruments.
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The community choir was started by Lesley because "what she loves to do most is to sing with other people." She also loves to see the support the group gives to each other and also "the joy in the room at the end of evening spent singing."
Their current songlist includes a wide variety of songs such as: Sammy Davis Jnr's”Rhythm of Life”, Josh Groban's “You Lift Me Up”,”Three Dog Night's”, “Joy to the World”,  Dave Dobbyn's “Welcome Home”, Bic Runga's “Hello, Hello”, and Ross Meecham's “The World Still Turns”.

The choir sings at the Anthony Wilding retirement village, the Aidanfield Christian School Fair, the St John of God Christmas Carols and have their own concerts at Te Hapua. The next place they are singing is the Aidanfield Christian School Fair on Saturday 19th of November.

The other musicians that often accompany the choir are local musician Ross Meecham playing his own songs. You may also hear the talents of Sam Watson, Catherine Bryant, Alex Bryan, Chris Horn, Matt Parker and the fabulous Kings Blues Band.

Prospective choristers do not have to audition; the only job requirement is that ".they enjoy singing. Everyone is welcome”. If you are interested in coming along to choir, message Lesley on the choir's Facebook page or email halswellcommunitychoir@gmail.com or turn up to practice on Monday evenings in the Aidanfield Christian School 7.15-9.15pm
 

Halswell Youth Achievement:The Adventures of Jasper and Sharkcrock in Magictopia

While most children at age six are learning to read, Jasper Harrison was writing a book. His book "The Adventures of Jasper and Sharkcrock in Magictopia" has now been published, and arrived as a lovely Christmas surprise.  Jasper opened his Christmas parcel and discovered his own book!

Japser's story is set in the magical world of Magictopia where the sky is red, the grass blue and houses are made of dragonfruit.     Magictopia is in civil war and Jasper Kungbear's parents, the King and Queen, have gone missing.  Jasper and his friends embark on an exciting journey to find the map that will lead them to his parents.  They encounter challenges such as vicious giant bombardier beetles, Ninja robots and the evil villain, Dr Poisoning Pirate.  The story is full of twists and turns because in Magictopia, the kingdom where one thousand witches and wizards reside, anything can happen. It is a delightful, humorous, original, action packed story that any primary school student would love to read. 

 Jasper loved putting all his creative ideas into one story.   Justin, Jasper's dad, said he “loved seeing the unbridled imagination of a six year old.  'Magictopia' is Jasper's world and it was a lot of fun to play around in a sandbox world and edit the story together."   They are currently writing Jasper's second book and plan to write more.

 A love of reading and a well-developed imagination have been nurtured in Jasper by his parents, Justin and Lisa, who began reading to him even before he was born.  He had had so many stories read to him that at age four and a half, he would happily read books by himself.  Furthermore, Jasper of his own accord, decided to read movie subtitles. "He did this for two and a half years and increased his reading speed considerably," notes Lisa.   "He reads up to ten hours a week, especially when he has discovered a new series that he loves."

Further confirming his writing talents, Jasper achieved a High Distinction in the writing ICAS exam, which is only achieved by the top 1% of students entered from Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific.

Other influences are his writing Granny and a writing Dad. His Granny, Tui Harrison, wrote for a regional newspaper and still enjoys writing the occasional poem and short story.   Her son, Justin, is a member of the Christchurch Writers Guild and reviews New Zealand books for "Takahe", a nationwide literary magazine.   Justin also loves to write fiction.  He, in fact, wrote his own first 20,000 word story when he was still at school and has written his own 120,000 word novel: "The Eye of Torrbey" which he hopes to get published soon.  Recently, too, he wrote its prequel: The Mage Wars.  Jasper credits "The Eye of Torrbey" as being an inspiration for his own writing.  

"The adventures of Jasper and Sharkcrock  in Magictopia" by Jasper and Justin Harrison can be purchased on Amazon, Fishpond or by emailing :  HarrisonFamilyPress@gmail.com   Look out also for  Jasper and Justin's next book in the Magictopia series that is coming out in November 2016.

Familiar Faces: Barry Perkins and Sal Marks

More often than not, when you walk into Halswell Hammer Hardware on the corner of Sparks Road and Halswell Road, you hear laughter and familiar banter going on between
Barry, Sal and their customers.  You get a sense of long history and long relationships at the shop. Sal began working at the shop in 1990 and Barry bought the franchise five years
later. But even if you are new to the area, Barry and Sal will chat away to you about your day, your projects, making you feel as though you are already “one of the locals”.
Surprisingly, even though Barry and Sal have been at the corner store for twenty and twenty-five years, respectively, they both travel long distances to get to work.  Barry commutes daily from Brighton as he “loves the beach” where he lives with his wife, Linda. And Sal drives from Eyreton, North Canterbury, where she lives with husband John and spends time working with young horses.
Sal’s interest in horses led her to a job in Kennedys Bush Road, working for Dr. Cliff Irvine and Sue Alexander who are world renown specialists in equine reproduction. Sal would
spend early mornings with the horses, and then go to Halswell Hammer Hardware. Today, she continues a similar pattern of being at the shop in the morning and then going home to handle young horses in Eyreton.
 Barry also cites horses as one of his interests commenting that he is a typical Kiwi bloke that loves rugby, league, cricket and horse racing.  He finds a little time to do DIY on
Saturday afternoons and Sundays, otherwise, you will find him at the store.
All of Barry’s working life has been in Hardware.  He retells the of a day when it all began by chance.  He was biking into town to see a girl when someone he knew yelled out to him
“Are you looking for work?”.   Having just finished school, he yelled “Yes” to which the man yelled back “You start Monday”! After this informal introduction to Briscoes, which was then a hardware and importing business, Barry worked for Ramset Fasteners in Hamilton and Wellington before coming back to Christchurch in 1990. Being in the hardware business, Barry and Sal have been privy to a steady stream of post-earthquake stories. Their tone saddens as they speak of the number of clients still waiting to have repairs done, but worse still is the number of clients coming in to buy supplies to repair the EQC work that has been done on their homes.  The shop, currently filled with painters, draping drop sheets and ladders, is also finally getting its repairs done. On a brighter note, Barry admits the earthquakes have had positive spin offs for Halswell businesses and the Halswell community.  They both agree that they love the spaciousness of the area and the friendly people that live here.
Words: Deb Harding-Browne

Familiar Faces: Kate Cleverly

Kate Cleverly is a familiar face in Halswell as she has been the organiser of many of the local community events over the last decade or so.  Think youth events such as Fusion, Blast Off, The Light Party, Skate Jam and community events such as The Halswell Market and The Halswell Dance; the central organiser behind them all is Kate.

Hailing originally from Wiltshire, England, Kate and her husband Jason and children Aimee and Matthew were drawn to Christchurch because of family connections; Kate’s Kiwi Granddad originated from Banks Peninsula.   While on holiday here, they were taken by the spacious surroundings and applied for residency. They decided to settle in Halswell because of the fact that “ it was close to the city centre but it still felt like a small town. There are lots of wide open spaces and you can easily get out into the countryside. You don’t have to go far and you are biking down a little leafy lane, and there is also a lot going on for kids here” enthuses Kate.

Community work has not always been the path that Kate has taken. On leaving school, she started out building computers in her Dad’s computing  business, then she worked as a data analyst in drug trialling.  Following that, she taught high school science for five years in the UK and four years here at Cashmere High School.  Kate stopped teaching after her son Matthew was born and as he got older, became the Children’s Youth Worker at Halswell Baptist Church. Since late 2013, Kate has worked as the Halswell Community Coordinator for the Halswell Community Project.

Community work for Kate became a passionate interest for her as she realised that the socialisation provided by the local hotel didn’t exist here in the way that it did in England,
which is less about a drinking culture and more about being a meeting place. However, after speaking to Kate for a while you begin to realise within her community focus is   a deep-seated desire to accommodate the youth in society. Anything with a youth focus is close to her heart and if you look at the events that she has organised, there is always a strong child and youth focus to it.  She credits this to feeling like a bit of an outsider when she was a child.  She feels compelled to make sure everyone has a sense of belonging, especially young people.

Some developments that Kate would love to encourage in Halswell are “more places for the young people to hang out, more youth involved in the decision-making process, more
ways to bring families together and to see all the schools working together”.  Although, she says, “But I also think Halswell is pretty cool as it is”.

Kate’s family is also a high priority for her.  Kate’s husband Jason, incidentally, is also well-known in this area as he worked as a much-loved pre-school teacher at “The Lighthouse” for several years.  Aimee and Matthew keep Kate busy with lots of after school lessons. As
 a family, they like to go to church, play board games, go biking, and get into the outdoors. Juggling a busy home and work schedule, Kate has been described by friends as “little dynamo” as she seems to take it all in her stride.  And Halswell, especially its younger population, has certainly been very fortunate to have some of Kate’s focus and energy directed its way.

Familiar Faces: Chrys Horn

Chrys Horn is well known to many Halswell people because of her work with the Halswell Community Project which began in 2010 with the first Halwell E-Newsletter, just prior to the Earthquakes.
After she connected with a few like-minded people, the HCP was formed officially in early 2012. Today, we would be without the Halswell monthly E-letter and  printed newsletter, the website, the blog, the community garden, the community market, and the welcome bags had she not had that vision six years ago. There has been a remarkable amount achieved in a short time thanks to the hard work of everyone involved with the HCP.
Chrys' love for this area has come from growing up here and her work here has most likely come about because she came from a family who modelled strong community values. Chrys' mum (Philippa) was involved in Brownies, Guides, the Halswell Swimming Club and started up the Halswell Library. Philippa still works for St Mary's Anglican church, mostly in Prebbleton, these days.
Chrys has worked  in a variety of places and jobs around New Zealand, with seasons of study in between.  After high school,  Chrys completed a science degree majoring in Botany at Canterbury University.  From there she went to Gore and for the next 6-7 years, Chrys tried her hand at tailing, woolshed rousing, and working as a hut warden, for DOC in Glenorchy, and in the Youth Hostels Association in various places in the lower South Island. It was here that  Chrys built a house with her partner.  Canterbury began to beckon again, when she moved here with her partner.  She enrolled at Lincoln University, and ended up staying longer than she had anticipated completing a Masters degree and then a Ph.D in Social Science.  She then worked for Landcare Research for a few years, working to see how communities could manage their natural resources and deal with environmental change.
Inspiration to start community work in Halswell came to Chrys because she had been working in many  other people’s communities while at Landcare Research and felt that she should do some work in her own community.  Her professional work made her aware that communities everywhere will have to change and need to be resilient to weather shocks such as drought flood, wind and so on,  that are occurring because of climate change. Of course, as we all learned, building resilience is also important for managing earthquakes as well.  The Halswell Community Project is Chrys' brainchild and all of the projects under its umbrella have been started with the intention of building closer social and economic connections here.
Chrys feels all of the projects are going well, although she would like to see more people involved in them. Her vision has also been inclusive.  She tries to work alongside other long established community groups such as schools, sports clubs, churches and the Halswell Residents Association.  Chrys wants to build a stronger Halswell, and living in a post-earthquake city, few would argue with this aspiration. Chrys, who is seen biking far more often than driving, would like to see a more walkable, bikeable community – something that she thinks would mean fewer traffic jams for those who need to use their cars.  On top of that good walking and biking opportunities makes places more attractive and means that people are likely to meet and talk to each other more often.  It also makes a community safer to get around for all that live there.
Working in a part time job at the Addington Timebank, Chrys is  developing a Halswell branch. Again, the idea behind the Timebank is to build a resilient community.  The Timebank is a good way to connect people with each other and find what skills are available locally. Chrys also works as a social scientist and does contract research for a range of organisations.   When Chrys is not working she likes to read, walk, bike and spend time with friends.
Most definitely a person of vision and action, Chrys Horn has helped to make this community far more connected and more of a home for us all and a place with a much stronger identity than it would have had otherwise.

Words: Deb Harding-Browne

Keeping Halswell the safe place it has always been

Halswell has long been a very safe community with low levels of crime.  Recently there has been a significant spike in crime, probably due the actions of a very small number of people, and for most of us this this is very unsettling.  

It is good to remember that much of the crime is petty in nature.  However, it is also important to remember to lock cars and homes, to remove valuables from cars, and generally to be security conscious.   Please do make the effort to report any crime to the police.  Even if they can’t do much straight away, they may be able to see patterns in what is going on which may help at a later date.  

Remember too that we all  actually  still live in a community of pretty trustworthy people who care about their neighbours.  There are regular discussions on Facebook and neighbourly where we see people actively helping each other out and thanking others for help, for example. 

Thanks to Halswell Miniature Trains for this pic!

There are a range of things that we can do as a community to discourage crime.  Setting up neighbourhood support groups, getting to know our neighbours, knowing what is going on in our community and knowing about groups that work to protect us are all useful.  

If you are interested, the Halswell Community Project are running a  meeting on Monday 20^t June from 7.00 til 9.00pm to the Baptist Church at 6 Balcairn St to discuss this.  A  number of people will speak about what already goes on in our community and how we can work together  to keep Halswell  the safe place it has always been.  There will be an opportunity for discussion afterwards.   

For anyone who can’t make it or who wants to hear more, the Halswell Liaison Group is also discussing Neighbourhood Support groups at midday on Wednesday 29^th June at Te Hāpua.

The skate park debate: Finding Common Ground

For those who don't know me, I've been working on a voluntary basis in Halswell for the last 7 years to build more connections between people in our community and to help people feel more connected here - to each other and to the things that go on.

Imagine my discomfort, then as I watch and participate in the debates around a venue for a youth facility and what it turn us into warring factions!

I was deeply upset at the meeting that the CCC ran at Halswell School to discuss this because of the way we were all steered away from talking about what clearly matters very deeply to us.  The meeting felt like it turned into an us versus them competiton.   It is not!  And it made me very sad that lovely people were essentially working very hard to dismiss each other.  This process has resulted in us missing the point by focusing our attention on a skate park.  Incidentally, we are also missing an opportunity to deepen our sense of community and with it to feel that we are ALL safe and supported as part of this community.

I work to build community because I see that everyone who lives here really matters and that we all do better if we look after each other.  Based on my own experience, and having studied the experiences of others, I know that we in Halswell are more than resourceful enough to deal with our differences, and meet each other's needs at the same time if we choose to work together.    I"m not arguing that it is easy and I am sure that we will have to work to discuss our disagreements.  I also know that we are stronger, safer and happier when we work together than when we split apart and lose sight of our common humanity and our common ground. 

My question to everyone is how can we meet the needs of all who live here?

• How can we meet the needs of our young people for a safe place to meet  and spend time with their friends, to play and build social skills together with other kids, and to have a safe place to develop and practice physical skills?  
• How can we meet the needs of local residents to feel safe and secure in their own homes?  
• How do we convince each other that we do in fact care for the wellbeing of all those we live near?   

At the moment I think that we are missing important understanding by focusing our attention on trying to influence the Community Board, rather than spending time talking to each other across the gap that seems to have opened up about how the needs of everyone can be met. This is not all our fault, but it IS for us to do something about.

Dismissing the needs of any group in this community is not, and never will be, the way through this.