Nadine Ford-- Neighbourhood Development: Carlton/Parkville Communities
Nadine has only recently moved into the position of Neighbourhood Development Officer for Carlton and Parkville. She grew up in a small town in New Zealand, studied at the University of Auckland, and has worked in local government in Auckland, London and Melbourne.
There are Neighbourhood Development Officers for various areas in the City of Melbourne. The roles of the Officer include:
- Build relationships with the community
- Strong knowledge of community groups, agencies and services
- Facilitate collaboration within the community
- Link and connect people and resources together
- Advocate to City of Mebourne officers and teams about dreams, strengths, needs and challences of the community.
There is a Carlton Community Framework which is a tripartite agreement between the City of Melbourne, University of Melbourne and Carlton Local Area Network (CLAN). Its vision is “Carlton is a vibrant, inclusive, equitable and thriving place to live, work, study and visit. A ‘collective impact model’ was used to put together a common agenda. This model involves 5 conditions: common agenda, shared measurement of outcomes, mutually reinforcing activities, continuous communication and a backbone support organization.
The Framework covers 5 key themes: arts, community, education, environment, health and safety.
Next week (17 September) there will be a meeting of the Carlton Collaboration Community Forum. This will look at what has been achieved over the past year, the new website and where to from here.
CLAN’s priorities for 2015 are:
- Carlton Harmony Day
- Safety in community (youth, children, estate residents)
- Community volunteering capacity building (ambassadors, champions/volunteering)
- Carlton collaboration framework—identification of themes/issues concerning local community and coordinated use of agencies to address them
- Youth engagement
Nadine ended by describing the new Kathleen Syme Library and Community Centre that her team runs (www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/CommunityServices/CommunityFacilities/CommunityInfrastructure/Pages/KathleenSymeCentre.aspx). There was discussion about the Club taking a tour of this Centre in the future.