The Wairarapa Community Centre Trust’s mission statement is ‘Empowering our community to be resilient and to work together to meet needs as they arise’; or as Manager Beverley Jack puts it, “we want to empower and connect our community, sharing knowledge and working together so that our whole community becomes aware of what is actually happening in our community.”
So 18 months ago when Mayor Lyn Patterson told a community network meeting that knowing that children in their community were going to sleep hungry was preventing her sleeping at night and asked the forum to address the issue, Beverley picked up the challenge.
As the Centre has a commercial kitchen their first response was to provide frozen meals that could be picked up by agencies which had clients in crisis situations and who were needing food. “We don’t work with individual families”, says Beverley,” as they might not want it known that they are in food poverty. We have over 40 agencies Wairarapa-wide making referrals.”
The centre works in partnership with Waiwaste, a food recovery organisation, the food bank, supermarkets and green grocers who have good but unsaleable food, as well as the community garden. Some staple products are purchased. Every week a large group of volunteers come into the centre’s commercial kitchen and work for four hours making ‘heat and eat’ meal from the food donated that week. These are then frozen, either as single meals, or as meals for different sized families. The food is nutritious and simple, which what they have found the community wants. In the last 18 months over 5000 meals have been sent out to people in need.
The next step was obvious to Beverley, teach people how to cook healthy meals for themselves. To make that happen, the Community Centre formed a partnership with Wairarapa REAP. Tracey Shepherd, who leads the education team there could see the programme would be a good fit with TEC-funded ACE: “Our role is to financially support the programme and make sure that the ACE fundholders’ conditions are met in terms of learner eligibility, tutor training and support, and making sure that literacy and numeracy are embedded. We also provide support during the delivery of the programme to make sure that it remains learner-focused.”
The free classes are advertised by the centre, with referrals coming from community agencies. They are for people 18 years and over, who need to upskill maybe because they have lost a spouse and are having to cook for one person, or they have never learned to cook. Each course is for four sessions of four hours, over four weeks, with 12 people on each course. Six courses were run last year. This year they will run eight.
During the course each pair of students is supported by a volunteer, who works through the recipes with them. At the end of four weeks students have 24 low-cost nutritious recipes – some vegetarian, some gluten free. And they learn how to improvise by using whatever is in the cupboard.
In the relaxed and friendly environment people get to know each other, become friends and exchange phone numbers. Through informal conversations people share what is going on in their lives and where appropriate they are referred on to other agencies, such as the women’s centre or budgeting services. “We are developing friendships, so people feel that they are connected to their community and have a sense of belonging,” says Beverley. “This is about the community taking responsibility and helping each other.”
Over 70 volunteers are involved in the two programmes. “Without this community participation” says Beverley, “and without the support from REAP, or without our collaboration with other organisations – none of this would be possible. And we are planning another course this year, on how to make eco-friendly cleaning products. It is another way that people can cut costs – and this time support the environment.”
Jared Renata – learner
I used to look in the cupboard and think, we’ve got nothing to eat! But now, so long as I keep the cupboard stocked with herbs and things like that, I can open the cupboard and find things to make a meal. You don’t have to buy things like sauce, you can make your own with thickeners. I have two boys and our favourite is a stir fry. Last time we made one we counted 11 different vegies going in. Our food budget hasn’t gone down, but we are eating more healthy meals. I now look at labels and see what’s in packaged food.