Showing & growing the good in our hood
Kai Avondale
Kai Avondale is a collective of free community food initiatives. The collective includes Feed the Streets, Free Guys, Breakfast Club and Food Rescue. With these programmes, Kai Avondale aims to improve access to kai for those that need it, provide places for people to connect socially and prevent food that’s still edible from being thrown out.
Eastdale Hub
In partnership with Avondale Community Action, we secured the lease on an empty council building at Eastdale Reserve near the end of 2019. The following year, we established Eastdale Hub – a free space for recreation and youth activities. The building itself comprises an office block with toilets, showers and a kitchenette, and a large shed space that we have renovated.
Storytelling
We use storytelling as a means to celebrate our people and places, promote local initiatives and events, keep our community aware and informed, and encourage people to participate locally. We primarily tell these stories via our People of Avondale profiles, the Great North Gallery we curate and our Social Media pages.
Whanaungatanga
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Collaboration
Whether it’s our own initiatives like Kai Avondale or Eastdale Hub, or projects we co-lead or support, we take a collaborative approach. By using our collective strengths, projects don’t live or die by one person or group’s contribution, and more people have an opportunity to be involved in our community and connect with each other in the process.
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Advocacy
Because we connect with so many local people through our mahi, we try and advocate for their needs and aspirations when we’re at the table with central or local government, or other service providers. This includes ongoing conversations with key stakeholders, attending various workshops and hui, and taking part in community consultations.
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Connecting
Over time, we have amassed a large network of contacts and gained lots of local knowledge and insights in the process. When people come to us with opportunities or seeking help, but we don’t have the relevant expertise or capacity ourselves, we try to connect them with people that do rather than reinvent the wheel.
Nāu te rourou, nāku te rourou, ka ora ai te iwi
With your food basket and my food basket the people will thrive
