Neighbourhood Houses Tasmania’s annual conference …

This Wednesday morning over 150 volunteers, staff and committee members from 33 communities across Tasmania will be gathering at the Baha’i Centre in Hobart for Neighbourhood Houses Tasmania’s annual conference. It’s no ordinary conference….

The theme is “Making It Happen” because that’s what Neighbourhood Houses do in the lowest socio-economic and isolated communities in Tasmania.

They’re coming from Georgetown and Geeveston, Risdon Vale and King Island, St Helens and Zeehan, Scottsdale and Rokeby to draw inspiration from our guest speakers, learn from each other, and get ideas from workshops as diverse as Financial Reporting , Supporting people with Drug Addiction, Facebook marketing and Self Care.

Stan Alves is a former AFL coach and champion footballer who played 226 games for the Melbourne Football Club. He is also a media personality, entrepreneur and successful businessman. Stan will be giving a plenary and a workshop on Leadership. We hear so much about heroic leaders, but Stan will be talking to the Op Shop volunteer and the person who volunteers to show families how to grow vegetables at home – about how they are leaders in their community, and how to be better at it.

Our other key note speaker is Mitch McPherson. Few people have the drive and dedication of Mitch. When his younger brother Ty took his own life in 2013, Mitch, a glazier by trade, turned the devastating loss into the successful suicide prevention charity SPEAK UP! Stay ChatTY. There will be a lot Houses will gain from Mitch’s difficult journey, as too many of them in the last year have dealt with suicide in their communities.

For full conference program click here: http://nht.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Program-201608111.pdf

John Hooper, Executive Officer at NHT, said:

“The conference brings together people who are working and volunteering at the grass roots for their communities. They may work or volunteer in the House’s breakfast club, community garden, men’s shed, or play group but all are united in wanting to make their communities better places for all. A lot of people talk about making Tasmania a better place – our mob are actually doing it!”

In the last year:

Over 445 000 contacts with community members across the network of 35 Houses

13 495 contacts were made by community members at each Neighbourhood House over the year

Volunteers contributed 189 608 hours of their time across the network

That’s 120 hours per week at each House – over 3 full time equivalents

Houses don’t work alone to strengthen their community – on average each House worked with 27 partner organisations

As Houses are such busy places doing so much, the conference offers a rare chance to come together and learn from others working on the same issues in communities spread across the state.

Delegates and Houses would be more than happy to talk to the media at the event or in other ways about what’s happening in their community, as would our key note speakers.
John Hooper