22 November 2013

Appeal Trust grants over $1 million towards surf lifesaving, school pools, sports and summer events

The Christchurch Earthquake Appeal Trust has granted over $1 million to five projects that help restore some of Canterbury’s summer activities impacted by the earthquakes.

  • Up to $95,000 for four Surf Life Saving Clubs (Taylors Mistake, South Brighton, Waikuku and New Brighton). For temporary repairs, and storage of surf life saving equipment and boats, to enable surf patrol services for this summer and the short-medium term.
  • Up to $150,000 towards repairing school swimming pools for term one 2014 at Linwood Avenue, Elmwood Normal, and St Albans Primary Schools. This will help to repair earthquake damage and reinstate important community facilities, and complements funding from schools themselves and central government through the Ministry of Education.
  • $400,000 for over 60 “Summer of Fun” events throughout greater Christchurch, Selwyn and Waimakariri Districts in 2014 and 2015. The purpose of these events is to foster community connectedness, wellbeing and resilience among the population. Run by the YMCA, the Methodist and Anglican Churches, and other community organisations, and is supported by Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority.
  • $400,000 to repair and replace access ramps to the water at Pleasant Point, Christchurch, Naval Point, Charteris Bay, Stewarts Gully and Waimakariri boating and yacht clubs. The ramps, for use by club members and the general public, will help relieve congestion on remaining ramps along the coastline and increase safety at existing sites.
  • Up to $222,000 for sport events and programmes across Christchurch, Selwyn and Waimakariri managed by Sport Canterbury, and will provide 30,000 people with the chance to participate in sports activities in their communities over the next two years.

The Appeal Trust is also funding:

  • $100,000 towards rebuilding the Pines Beach/Kairaki Community Hall, which was damaged in earthquakes and is owned 100% by the local community.

Loss of recreational, cultural and leisure time activities, has been identified as one of the highest negative stress factors affecting people’s wellbeing in Canterbury.

Christchurch Earthquake Appeal Trustee Dr Rod Carr says “these projects are all helping in their own ways to make their communities great places to live in, and Trustees were keen to allocate Appeal funds now to help these initiatives happen much sooner than they would otherwise have.”

Linwood Avenue School Principal Gerard Direen says for its 320 children “being able to swim again will be magic for their self esteem and their life skills. Our community has lost access to a number of facilities and our children are still dealing with difficulties after the earthquakes, so being able to repair our two swimming pools is great on a whole lot of levels for our school and our community.”

In 2012, term one, children in Linwood had access to a temporary pool through the “Pools in Schoolz” initiative provided with funds from the Appeal Trust. This pool is now at Beckenham primary school being enjoyed by its 475 students.

Other projects funded with Appeal funds to date include: community centres for Aranui, Mt Pleasant, Belfast and Opawa; supporting Canterbury’s 200 youth workers; iPads/Netbooks and software for primary school children in eastern suburbs; counselling for children and young people; as well as $15 million “Connecting the City to the Sea”; water attractions at the new Christchurch City Council sports centre for the eastern suburbs; Kaiapoi - repairing walkways, cycleways and other public amenities along the Kaiapoi River; restoration of the Arts Centre; the Re:START mall; St John emergency equipment; Isaac Theatre Royal; and, repairing sports fields and netball/tennis courts.

A full list of projects funded by the Appeal Trust is available here.

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