Mayor meets Rodney church ministers

“Our local churches’ involvement with community activities make them ideally suited to address many of the issues facing our youth in the HibiscusCoast. I encourage the churches to explore ways of maximizing their energies towards a synergy that will have much more powerful results,” said Mayor John Lawduring a breakfast meeting last week when he hosted 19 church ministers from the HibiscusCoastarea.

The meeting was part of the process of involving different community interest groups in seeking solutions and proactive initiatives to support HibiscusCoastyouth.

Mayor Law said that more than half of the people in our community have problems of some sort, and many people don’t know how to deal with it. Some deal with their problems in the wrong way, which often leads to criminal activities or putting themselves under health risk.

He expressed his concern that some voluntary services are struggling to do their work with a dwindling number of available volunteers and made an appeal to the community to get involved with structures as volunteers. He emphasised that volunteers form the fabric of society.

Mayor Law said that a collective strategy was needed to “bring everybody’s energies together” and added that too many smaller groups “fall through the cracks” in their struggles to get a slice of available funding.

He was scathing of school and class sizes and felt that the problem was increasing rather than improving. He said teachers have become class room managers, rather than simply being teachers and feels this could be addressed through a collective community voice.

Paul Green, Rodney’s Safer Community Coordinator said churches have a huge influence on how the community feels and responds to issues. Part of the council’s commitment is to help make Rodney a great place to work, play and stay, and this applies to our youth as well. The council is involved in a process of analysing youth crime statistics to come to grips with where issues are more predominant and what they really are about, in order for them to be addressed.

He added that the most pressing issue facing them currently is to reduce the negative sphere of influence. He was of the opinion that the churches could play a huge role in minimising the instances where “middle of the road” kids are influenced to offend.

He said that the council aims to respond to the community’s needs. A good example is the recent addition to the Liquor Ban bylaw of specified places on the HibiscusCoast, which was enacted in partnership between Police and Council in response to serious concerns raised by the community.

The ministers in attendance agreed to meet again next week to further explore the issues. Mayor Law said that the council would endeavour to facilitate similar sessions on an annual basis.

The meeting raised $135 for the Coast Youth Community Trust, which will be matched by the Rodney District Council.

ENDS

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