In the Hamilton Area, CPPS operates community work in Hamilton, Taumarunui, Te Awamutu, Te Kuiti, and Huntly. Find contact details for the Hamilton Area.
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Excerpt from Community Works Issue 4, August 2005 |
Community Work offenders have left a permanent mark on the grounds of Hamilton’s Atawhai Assisi Home and Hospital.
In the past 12 months, dozens of men and women working off their sentences have helped maintain the grounds and created a special garden for residents and their visitors to enjoy.
Senior Community Work Supervisor Storm Powell from the Community Probation Service (CPS) says the work parties have used existing skills and learned new ones – like mixing concrete by hand, laying mosaics, and sowing new lawns.
One major improvement has been the Sacred Space garden featuring a koru-shaped, wheelchair-friendly pathway, new plantings and a waterfall.
The regular work parties started after CPS was called in to clean up the grounds after major building work. They now visit the site fortnightly to help with gardens and maintenance.
“The offenders really look forward to going out there. I rotate the groups as much as I can to give as many offenders as possible a chance to take part,” says Storm.
The rest home on Matangi Rd was started 32 years ago and is owned by a charitable trust run by the Catholic Sisters of Mercy.
Property Manager John Williams says the 68-bed facility’s extensive gardens are easier to maintain with the help of the work parties. And he says the benefits go both ways.
“Assisi values the partnership with CPS. We don’t see any negatives. They work in a very nice environment and we teach them some skills if they want to learn them.”
John says the Sacred Space project has proved a huge success. Each time a new stage was reached there happened to be someone in the work party with the skills they needed.
“When it came to laying the foundation for the koru, one member of the work party turned out to be a concrete specialist. He suggested colouring the concrete to add to the design – so now we have a terracotta-coloured base for the tile mosaic.”
As the grounds have improved, John’s noticed an increasing appreciation among offenders of the work they’re doing. “We would like to think that some of them have gone away with some new skills.”