community services awards

winner

St Patrick’s Community Support Centre (St Pat’s)

Fremantle WA

St Pat’s is recognised for its leadership on several innovative and collaborative programs, which support families and individuals facing complex challenges. 

Programs include Library Connect, the first of its kind in WA. Delivered in partnership with the City of Fremantle, the program places a St Pat’s support worker within the welcoming environment of the public library, improving access to supports for families and individuals and reducing stigma.

During COVID, St Pat’s delivered 35,000 meals as part of the Doorstop Diners program, ensuring people experiencing disadvantage or isolation had access to nutritious daily meals and support services. Their ‘20 Lives 20 Homes’ Fremantle pilot program had a 76% success rate in supporting people to not only secure but maintain permanent housing. 

St Pat’s plans to host ongoing social engagement activities for families and individuals, such as art and storytelling workshops.

Women’s Health & Family Services

Northbridge WA

Women’s Health & Family Services (WHFS) is recognised for their commitment to providing excellent, connected healthcare for women.

Until 2021, there was no single client information record that could be shared between their primary care providers, counsellors and family and domestic violence advocates.

The team addressed this issue by implementing a cloud based primary (GP) software, so all practitioners can access case notes. Now, clients do not have to re-tell their story, or history, as they move between programmes within the organisation, which helps provide a more holistic service. The new system also enables the team to monitor the quality and effectiveness of their services, leading to improved health outcomes.

WHFS plan to deploy a client portal, embedded into the organisation’s website, where clients can self-refer and book appointments with the team. 

Zonta House Refuge Association

Willetton WA

Zonta House Refuge Association is recognised for its work in providing the necessary supports and opportunities for victim/survivors who are experiencing family and domestic violence (FDV) and their families, from prevention to crisis response to recovery, redress and rebuilding.

The team seeks to adapt, improve, partner, and grow their services by listening to the women accessing their programs, researching good practice, and analysing the data collected to inform a range of programs that provide support, opportunities, and advocacy for women and their families.

Its latest program Empowerment through Education, provides FDV education sessions to other service providers, workplaces and community members to increase awareness and improve responses to FDV. Zonta House would like to engage with The Blue Knot Foundation to provide training that will build on the knowledge of complex trauma and trauma-informed practice.

winner

Catholic Healthcare Hoarding & Squalor team

Macquarie Park NSW

The Catholic Healthcare Hoarding & Squalor (H&S) team is recognised for introducing several innovative and complementary programs for older people in NSW facing issues with hoarding and squalor.

The team began providing in-home support in 2015 and now offers comprehensive case management, one-on-one decluttering, rubbish removal, forensic cleaning and teaches living skills across NSW. This helps clients manage accumulation tendencies, reduces risks to safety and risk of homelessness, and improves mental health and wellbeing.

Programs include the ‘Buried in Treasures’ support program, which provides in-depth training and support, online declutter groups for participants to develop social connections with each other, and a psychosocial support program for clients with underlying and additional mental health challenges.

They plan to create video content in partnership with consumers and clients that introduces the H&S program and its person-centred approach.

Health on the Streets team

Erina NSW

The Health on the Streets (HoTS) team is recognised for their work delivering clinics and outreach street care for people experiencing homelessness on NSW’s Central Coast. 

Their nurse-led service was designed in response to the growing homelessness issue on the Central Coast. Since 2020 their work has diverted non-urgent cases from hospitals, reduced emergency hospital admissions, reduced the transmission of bloodborne diseases and sexually transmitted infections through education and treatment, and improved healthcare and the physical and mental health of the homeless population on the Central Coast. The team also works to identify and treat Hepatitis C among the homeless population.

HoTS would use the prize money to support and enhance ongoing services and supports that the team provide to their clients, including purchasing more sleeping bags, personal hygiene packs, and fuel and Opal cards. 

Treasured Babies Program

Mooroolbark VIC

The Treasured Babies volunteers are recognised for their work over the past 20 years to acknowledge and honour the lives of babies who have died. The program supports bereaved parents by providing beautiful size-appropriate handmade clothing, memory boxes and coffins for their babies.

Every week, up to 10 volunteers meet in an old vacant shop where they coordinate the packing of gift sets for bereaved parents. Supporting them from a distance are 70 volunteers who knit, sew, and crochet tiny outfits and blankets and send them to the Melbourne-based volunteers for distribution around Australia. 

The group is united in the knowledge they are helping make a real difference for parents who are grieving the devastating loss of their baby.