The mission statement of the Girl Guides’ Association of New Zealand proclaims that, amongst its many noble aims, its purpose is to help girls develop into confident and self-respecting women who will make a positive contribution to their community. With this aim in mind, she has worked for the movement for seventeen years, mostly as a Brownie leader, but for the past four years as the Regional Brownie Advisor for the Canterbury North Region. She is a member of the Regional Executive and a District Co-ordinator. She loves the outdoors and shares that passion annually with over eighty girls aged seven to ten years at the Regional Brownie Holiday Camp. She holds a First Aid Certificate and a Cooks and Campfires Certificate as well as many other training and good service awards. She willingly gives her time and expertise to the many Regional Committees, organising large events for girls of all ages. Ever true to the mission statement, she is passionate about the training of Leaders, that they in their turn shall guide more and more girls to become leaders of their communities. Elizabeth (Liz) Bailey
For twenty three years she has served the 16th Christchurch Girl’s Brigade Company at St. Giles’ Church in Papanui, for sixteen of those years as a commissioned officer. For the first seven years she was Mother Help before receiving her commission as Lieutenant, becoming Acting Junior Leader and then Junior Leader. This year, in the absence of a Captain, she acting in that position, dealing with administrative matters and assisting with the senior programme as well. She takes her charges on outings, has sleepovers with them and has shared her many domestic skills with countless girls over the years. She has worked for Barnados for five years, collecting charity boxes, assisting with fundraising and selling balloons. She recently became a volunteer worker at the Police Kiosk in the Square. Despite the fact that she does not drive, she has somehow always managed to attend to her many commitments on time. Her selfless devotion and capable leadership have helped so many young girls to grow into positive and contributing members of society. Helen Maureen Caldwell
The changing nature of society over the last few decades has seen profound changes in the nature of the family. An increasing divorce rate, the growth of single parent families, the demise of the extended family, and increasing opportunities to move around have brought about a fragmentation of society. As the importance of the family has declined, so the need for community involvement has increased. The Neighbourhood Cottage has become a significant centre of community life, raising an audible voice for the community when individual voices all too often go unheard . The Richmond Neighbourhood Cottage Inc. forms just such a centre. She has been involved with the Cottage for six years, for five of which she has been either Secretary or Secretary-Treasurer. She has carried a heavy responsibility over the last five years in the battle against the establishment of a Periodic Detention Centre in the area, a fight that has been taken all the way to the High Court. She has enabled the Cottage Committee to grow and become more effective in community issues, whilst juggling this responsibility with a nineteen year period of service with the Girl Guide Movement. The Richmond Community Cottage is deeply indebted to her. Margaret Jean Cockburn
Television, home computers and the Internet, together with a culture that promotes and accepts the consumption of fast food are all working together to create a generation of young people who are unfit and unhealthy. Increasingly young people demand to be entertained rather than entertain themselves, to watch rather than to do. Luckily for society, there are still those who are dedicated to maintaining health and fitness in young people, and are prepared to give their time and energy to that end. He has been involved with Barry’s Boxing Gym for the past twenty years, working tirelessly in all capacities, including that of committee member. When transport is needed to travel out of town to tournaments in other centres, he has always been on hand to help. When the ring has to be erected prior to a match, he is there to set it up. Almost single handed, he takes care of the maintenance of the ring and the equipment, and he plays a major role in the vital fund-raising activities. For two decades he has helped to promote the virtues of physical fitness, self-esteem and honourable conduct that are the hallmarks of the sport of boxing. Glennon (Cookie) Cook
Very much a family person, she has managed to find the time within a busy career as a mother, grandmother and teacher, to involve herself in a wide range of community works. As a teacher at Avonside Girls’ High School for eighteen years, she organised the World Vision 40 hour famines for fifteen years. She organised Theatre Sports, wrote school musicals and was a Christian Group Leader. She has been involved with the Girls Brigade for at least twenty five years, as well as conducting Sunday School and Bible Class. She was involved for many years with the Oxford Terrace Baptist Church and was the instigator of the Friday evening drop-in centre. She is a founding trustee of Newell House, an emergency home for women and children. Suffering from bronchitis, she joined the Respiratory Relief Society in June 1995, and over the last five years has been one of its most energetic workers, as Assistant Secretary, Acting Vice President, Vice President and now Acting President. Despite health problems, she has continued to work tirelessly for the many groups with which she has been involved, truly bringing a breath of fresh air to her community. Mona Hampton
Industrial growth has been a two edged sword. One the one hand, industry provides jobs and incomes. It provides the goods and services that we need and have come to expect to support the modern way of life, and it provides the economic growth that is needed to provide these things in the future. But the other edge of the sword cuts deeply into the environment. Inevitably, raw materials are extracted from nature, processed, packaged and transported to market. The extraction, processing, packaging and transportation hack large and often irreparable holes in the environment, and, unless carefully watched, industrialists would destroy that environment along with our future. Keenly aware of this peril, he became a founding member of the Belfast Environment Trust to carry the battle for the environment forward. As Chairperson from 1996 to 1999 his outstanding organisational skills have seen him involved in the preparation of submissions to resource management hearings, writing letters, running monthly committee meetings, fundraising and generally raising awareness of environmental degradation. Although no longer a committee member he has set a benchmark in leadership and dedication that shall long be looked back to as a standard of excellence. Graeme Kerr
Once upon a time a high school was a place where boys and girls went to learn mathematics and English, science and geography, French and social studies, and to be inculcated with the glories of sport. Today’s high school is a sophisticated and complex environment and Boards of Trustees have as many cares as any board of directors of a large private company. To this he has devoted his time and energy for more than thirteen years. Treasurer of Papanui High School’s PTA, he joined the Board of Trustees from Tomorrow’s Schools in 1989, serving as Deputy Chair from 1989, and as Chair from 1997. He was Chair of the school’s Discipline Committee from 1989 to 1999, and served on the Asset and Property and the Promotion and Consultation Committees. He is an active member of the Papanui High School Foundation, and is a founder and Trust member of Te Kaupapa Whakaora, the school’s alternative education unit. He is a member of the Jubilee Committee, and a promoter and supporter of the North West Cluster of Boards of Trustees. Without his vast contribution, Papanui High School would be far from the successful institution that it is. Grant Major
The modern secondary school is very much a creation of the last quarter of a century. Unlike their predecessors, the secondary teachers of today are much more than educators. They are also counsellors, business advisors, employment officers, community liaison officers, legal experts, trade unionists, and, all too tragically often, parent surrogates. The secondary school is no longer an institution in isolation, but very much a part of its community and must be thoroughly integrated into a modern multi-cultural social milieu. This school is an integral part of its community, taking an active rôle in the discussion of and decision making on the wider issues of the community, joining with Northlands Mall in the funding of a youth worker, and with the City Council in the redevelopment of the mall site to better manage traffic flows. It was the prime instigator of the Asian Research, jointly undertaken with the Shirley – Papanui Community Board, that has seen the appointment of an Asian Youth worker for the whole of north west Christchurch. If energy, lateral thinking, community involvement and 20:20 social vision are the criteria, then it is indeed the very model of a modern secondary school. Papanui High School
Few events could be more tragic than a home burned down. A lifetime of effort goes up in a roar of smoke and flame and with it not only valuables but those little personal things that are irreplaceable: letters, photographs, the memorabilia of the years. A shop explodes in flames and is destroyed within minutes, and with it a livelihood and a comfortable old age. The first line of defence against this demon is the Fire Brigade, a group of totally dedicated men and women who pit their strength, their skill, and often their very lives to save us from this horror. The volunteer fire fighters stand ever ready to turn out to rescue lives and property not only from fire, but from all manner of disasters: roofs blown off in storms, people trapped in mangled vehicles, dangerous chemicals spilled on roads, children fallen down holes. On the 19th of August 2000 he was awarded the Fire Service Gold Star in recognition of twenty-five years of dedicated service with the Brooklands Fire Brigade, and well he deserves the Community Award to companion it. He and his colleagues are the true heroes of our time. Deputy Chief Fire Officer John David Reed
Toastmasters is a voluntary, community-based, not-for-profit organisation dedicated to the fields of training in communications skills, career needs, and community service. It nurtures the ancient and honourable arts of rhetoric and public speaking, and teaches important skills such as committee procedures, besides forming a valuable social circle. In his long association with Toastmasters, he has proved himself to be hard-working and dedicated to helping his fellow human beings towards achieving the noble goals of the organisation. His devotion is borne out by his recent work in establishing the Northside Toastmasters Club, of which he is Chairman, to serve the residents of Redwood, Northcote and Papanui. Besides his Toastmasters involvement, he is. in association with the Belfast-Redwood Community Constable, an energetic organiser and co-ordinator at the Neighbourhood Support Group, and he is active in broader local issues in his position of Chairman of the Redwoods Residents Association. In any community endeavour in which he is or has been engaged, he gives of his time unstintingly and enthusiastically. John Shillito Saxton
The list of his contributions over the last three decades is encyclopaedic. He has been involved with the Mairehau Scout Group for some twenty five years, as committee member, chairman and treasurer. He has organised bottle drives and painted the Scout Den, mowed lawns, attended to security, organised fundraising, and has been central to the organisation of the Blue Skies programme. He has long been associated with the Church of St. Pius X, cleaning the church, counting the collection, and organising the Mission Circle for the elderly. Once a month he helps transport the elderly to Housie, and acts as caller. He joined the committee of the Mairehau Community Library in 1993, acting as President from 1994 to 2000, and worked at the library every Wednesday afternoon from 1992 to 1999. He is on the City Council Committee for the structure of Community Libraries. He has for thirteen years been on the committee of Mairehau Parish Indoor Bowls, and has had almost thirty years’ association with Our Lady of Fatima School, serving on the PTA, organising Christmas Tree sales and fairs. Year in, year out, he has served his community unremittingly. Surely he is a man for all seasons. David Taylor
His has become a household name throughout New Zealand. A dastardly and vicious assault on another’s elderly mother would have made the headlines for a day or two, and then been forgotten as the appalling litany of assaults, robbery and murder continued to unroll. This he could not abide. One pebble dislodged dislodges larger and ever larger stones and thus begins the avalanche. For eighteen months he travelled the country, a one man avalanche of public anger and indignation and he would not be silenced. He gave his all, financially and emotionally, eventually collecting a quarter of a million signatures on a petition for sterner punishment for violent criminals that forced the Government to hold a referendum that was overwhelmingly supported. He is living proof that individuals are not powerless in the face of a monolithic and entrenched establishment. He has demonstrated beyond all doubt that the ordinary man or woman in the street can raise a voice that shall be heard and heeded even in the highest of ivory towers. He is a man of and for his community whose personal example of tenacity, dedication and strength must inspire and empower every member of every community throughout the land. Norman Withers
Poddimok 