After months of work by volunteers and support from the politicians and council, the new Pottsville Beach Neighbourhood Centre building will be officially opened on Friday.
Centre manager Angela Maxwell said the work started back in March of last year on the building, which is a focal point of the Pottsville community, will house all sorts of facilities and activities for the local community.
The location in Elizabeth Street has long been a meeting place for the people of Pottsville, originally housing the school although Angela said some local community members thought the site had been in use as a meeting space for a lot longer than that.
“We have been told by one local Elder that this was a meeting place for the Bundjalung people back before the school was built,” she said.
The new building will serve as a one stop meeting place for the people of Pottsville, housing a Centrelink Agency, Opshop, Tech Centre, youth mentoring, playgroup, toy-libraries, parenting courses, light aerobics, circus gym, early intervention family support, mobile library and all sorts of other groups, services and courses that community members may need from counselling to legal services.
The centre is also a first point of contact for new residents to the area – offering a “Welcome to Pottsville” kit to introduce newcomers to all the groups and services available in the area and give them a way of meeting people.
The centre came into being in 1999-2000, operating out of the old Pottsville school buildings. However over the years it has continued to expand and out-grown its original buildings.
The new building came into operation in mid-January and is the result of a partnership between the Tweed Shire Council (Stage 2 main construction), PBNC (design and progress participation and monetary contributions towards all stages) and NSW Premier’s and Cabinet Department (Stage 1 and 3) via funding from the Community Building Partnerships’ Program.
Angela said the PBNC’s volunteer team had contributed an amazing amount of hours to the project.
She said a conservative estimate of this “in kind” contribution was about $150-200k labour costs and climbing higher.
According to Angela the volunteers brought a wealth of experience in all sorts of fields from civil works to accountancy and everything in between .
The previous building (which also contained asbestos) was very small and unsuitable for the delivery of community/social services.
She said the larger, multi-purpose design of the new building had superior, safer and more comfortable access for volunteers, workers, participants and clients.
The new Neighbourhood Centre building will be officially opened on Friday, February 17 from 2pm.
