By Pam Kiriakidis
Emergency relief, technology assistance and isolation are among topics Whittlesea Community House can assist with at its new pop-up drop-in facility on Church Street.
Officially launched last week, the new hub, located at the former Westpac bank building, was established to address specific issues that relate to community members experiencing isolation, homelessness and wellbeing support.
Whittlesea Community House committee of management chair Kerry Clarke said the new arrangement had helped more than 50 people in the past week.
Ms Clarke said people from all walks of life visited the premises for different services such as online banking, scam awareness and upcoming community events and courses.
“We’re adding to our services in a different way because we’re meeting different people, we’re surprised about the number of people who came in who are really struggling,” she said.
“There are all sorts of conversations from people who wanted to chat, people whose partners have dementia … people looking for the 250-lapel bowls.
“We’ve got a little bit of a food bank where people can come in, and we can give them a bag of groceries, sometimes if we get some money, we can then go and buy a whole bunch of IGA vouchers.”
The closure of the Westpac branch was a loss for the people of Whittlesea. However thanks to a month’s free rent donated by landlord owners Bryan and Miriam Matthews, the community house can use the space to be closer to community members.
“The drop-in centre was something that we felt was needed because we were having a lot of people dropping in at the house, and mainly our role there is to run classes and courses, and it meant we didn’t really have space where people could just sit and chat,” Ms Clarke said.
Federal Member of McEwen Rob Mitchell said he was in support of the new set-up that was also made possible through Australia Post’s 2022 Community Grant.
Mr Mitchell said the ‘Relax, Recharge and Reconnect’ program would navigate people who needed the extra support of setting up bank accounts or seeking financial advice.
“As we get more technical, I think we find more and more isolation, and we lose that community structure,” he said.
“One of the things we do find is people that can’t use phones properly or computers get really locked out of everything very quickly, and they have nowhere to turn to.
“We are very lucky that we’ve got the [community house], which does just a fantastic job on doing a whole range of things.”
Whittlesea Community House’s new mobile location will be open until December 19.
Residents can visit any time from 10am to 2pm Monday to Thursday, at 63 Church Street, Whittlesea.
