From a trail of historically informative signs to empowerment through period products, many community groups and organisations are doing amazing things in central Auckland.
Check out these highlights from activities supported by Waitematā Local Board in the latest local grants round:
Auckland King Tides Initiative - Community CoastSnap Beach Monitoring
The Auckland King Tides Initiative is a 'citizen science' programme that invites the public to capture the visual impact of king tides at their own local coastal environments as a means of understanding the potential impacts of sea level rise in the next 30-50 years.
The project involves constructing and installing CoastSnap devices at public coastal locations that can be monitored by local communities, which will be supported by an existing website and social media platforms. The process of capturing beach state data provides an opportunity for communities to learn about the causes and impacts of sea level rise on their coastline and prepare for the future.
CoastSnap devices provide a focal point for communities, where repeat photos track how the coast is changing over time due to processes such as storms, rising sea levels, human activities, and other factors. CoastSnap turns photos into valuable coastal data that is used by coastal scientists to understand and forecast how coastlines might change in the coming decades.
Waitematā Local Board granted $5,000 towards the costs of the project.
Newmarket Business Association – Heritage Trail Project
The Newmarket Heritage Trail will celebrate key historical landmarks within the Newmarket precinct. It will recognise Māori, Chinese and early settler locations of interest and will educate the wider Newmarket community about the area's history.
The design of the signage will point members of the public to a website which will be easily and readily updated. The project's design also allows for new sites to be added in the future.
Key points of interest will be signposted with imagery and text detailing the location’s history, in both English and Te Reo. The first will be on the corner of Mortimer Pass and Broadway, where Te Ti Tūtahi once stood.
Newmarket Business Association were awarded $7,000 for this project in the Local Grant funding round.
The Period Place – Impact Partner Programme
The Period Place is Aotearoa's largest period advocacy charity working to eliminate period poverty in New Zealand. Their mission is 'intergenerational period equity for Aotearoa', which they are working towards through reducing menstrual stigma and taboo through conversations, education, and increasing access to period products.
The Period Place’s Impact Partner Programme connects with Impact Partners nationwide - community groups, religious groups, maraes, food banks and other charities who possess the mana and relationships in their communities to distribute period products as they see fit. With donations and funding, they provided over 54,000 period products to Kiwis in 2021 alone.
"So many families are struggling at the moment and we've seen requests for period products surge in the last few months,” says Maggie Behrend, Fundraising Coordinator for The Period Place.
“Grants like the one from the Waitematā Local Board are crucial to our organisation; they enable us to provide period products to our partners working in the community and to alleviate period poverty which can be so harmful to physical, social, spiritual and mental wellbeing."
The Period Place was allocated $5,000 of Local Grant funding towards distribution of period products to Impact Partners in the local board area, including Auckland City Mission, Littlemore, Koha Apparel, and Rainbow Youth.
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