Member Spotlight: Wyong Neighbourhood Centre

NCOSS spoke to Kylie Hopkins, Manager of Wyong Neighbourhood Centre.

1. Tell me about Wyong Neighbourhood Centre

We’re located in an old school, and so there are lots of small buildings rather than one large building on the site, and it’s a heritage conservation area as well. The school was first built and opened in 1889. We have been here on this site for at least 35 years. It’s quite unique, in that we lease three of the buildings from Central Coast Council, rather than a whole community centre.

We are funded to provide two community hubs in Wyong and Gosford. We also have a youth service, financial counsellors and a financial capability worker. Additionally, we are a funded emergency relief provider.

We have a very large client base and serve community members with over 30,000 sessions per year.

Because there is so much open space, we have had people camping on that open space over the last seven years or so. There’s a lot of social issues that go along with it, a lot of drug and alcohol and mental health issues. That’s very sad because we’re also seeing people go unsupported by services that traditionally address these issues. I’m seeing and hearing too many stories like this.

To access temporary accommodation, people must be applying for rentals. But they can’t apply for a rental unless they attend an inspection in person; they can’t simply apply online. That means travelling, and without a car, it means relying on public transport. Getting around to rental inspections by public transport on the Central Coast is extremely difficult, especially with children in tow. So I can understand why some people would see putting up a tent somewhere as preferable.

2. Neighbourhood centres are often the first safety net people reach out to. Can you share a story or example that captures what makes a place-based, community hub model so essential for local families?

We’ve been here in the same spot for 40 years. So, people have known about this centre for a long time, and neighbourhood centres mean that you can go to one place and you can tell your story, and you can get an adequate referrals – not just an email or a phone number given to you, somebody will actually talk you through the process.

Recently, we were able to assist someone get a new passport and worked with him and his family to get him back to his country of origin to rejoin family and support systems here. He had been sleeping on the site here for several years.

I was pleased to see that the new funding model from Department of Communities and Justice did include advocacy and support for neighbourhood centres to deliver. However, they did not reduce our other requirements for information, advice, and referral. In the future, we want to see a focus on what we’re actually doing, which is a much longer interaction and we want that to be reflected in our contracts. But at the same time, core funding would make a huge difference to our availability.

3. Regional areas like the Central Coast are feeling a unique squeeze. How has the surge in food and housing insecurity altered the demand for your core drop-in and support services?

Yes. We’ve tried lots of different things to try and address that. We’ve had drop-in breakfast programs. We’ve increased our access to food even when we’re not here. We have a covered deck area, and we were lucky enough to get a big fridge from a Woolworths donation that has been invaluable because we can put all of our Second Bite food into that fridge, and people can come even when we’re not open.

But again, that has addressed the increase in demand in a way that hasn’t been funded.

We have a frozen meal program, where volunteers cook meals using a lot of the donated food that comes through Oz Harvest and Second Bite. So, we very rarely have to buy any ingredients for that program. It’s mostly through those donated programs, but we produce about 250 meals a week, and they all go.

I think people want the social aspect as well, so it’s not just about the food; it’s the social side of things. For example, we have had some mums who drop their children off at the primary school and then come and hang out because petrol is really expensive.

4. If you had 5 minutes with NSW policy makers today, what single systemic change would make the biggest difference to the communities Wyong Neighbourhood Centre serves?

I think it’s around building wraparound services that are dealing with homelessness, mental health and drug and alcohol support, in one go. Because what happens a lot of times is that people can’t access the housing services because they’ve got a mental health condition or a drug and alcohol condition that is preventing them from being a good tenant. So even if they could access housing programs, they would probably not last in those programs because they haven’t got the resources around mental health and drug and alcohol counselling and treatment programs. But when you put that together with housing, or the lack of housing and the competition for housing, there’s a group of people who are really out in the cold.

Our biggest ask is to deal with this homelessness problem on a wraparound basis.

If we want to solve this problem, the rate of new housing projects has to increase substantially because they’re not going to solve it in 20 years at the rate they’re going. In the meantime, we’d like to see innovative projects that give people dignity while they wait for wrap-around projects that will address all their needs.