Editorial: Community in action
Minister James Browne speaks at the launch of the North-West Suburbs Community Action Plan 2024-2030.
The past week has seen communities across Waterford in action in various forms. At the weekend, it could not have been more visible with a sea of orange t-shirts taking part in the Solas Cancer Support Centre's Run and Walk for Life. Both Waterford city and Dungarvan hosted events, with distances suitable for the whole family to participate.
Across social media stories emerged of why people were running; for deceased family members, for those who have come through a cancer journey, for friends and family members, even those currently ill with cancer took part.
It was in many cases a joyous, if often poignant occasion, as the Waterford community - east and west of the county - came out in force to give back to the powerhouse that is the Solas Cancer Support Centre.
Countless Waterfordians have leaned on the services at Solas, which aptly terms itself "a sanctuary for all". Solas' core values are fundamental to the services they provide: excellence, empowerment, trustworthiness, community, respect. Carrying these values front and centre, Solas has grown and developed alongside the needs of people across Waterford and the South East, who it serves.
The huge turnout at the weekend's events was testament to the value Waterford people place on this crucial service, an their pride in its highest quality services, for which Waterford is incredibly grateful.
The Run and Walk for Life events in turn support financially the continued success of Solas in supporting our community.
Meanwhile, over in Carrickphierish Library a small group of people gathered for the launch of the North-West Suburbs Community Action Plan 2024-2030. The fact that the plan is the first of its kind in 25 years for this area should come as somewhat of a wake-up call.
In the announcement of the plan, and its rollout, chairperson of the Waterford Local Community Safety Partnership (WLCSP), Sean Aylward said it was based upon actioning the community’s priorities "for the social and economic development of the area".
The challenges identified would not surprise, and have been reflected in stories previously covered by the Waterford News & Star. They include unbalanced development, higher than-average unemployment rates, low education levels, and a high proportion of unskilled labour. The area includes a large presence of social housing, lone-parent households, and young families, with a significant proportion of households where English is not the primary language.
"It was evident during our consultation process that childcare and community and family support services, among other supports and services, in the North-West Suburbs do not meet current and future needs," said Mr Aylward.
The new action plan, rather than the current reactionary way of dealing with a myriad of issues and concerns across the north-west city community, should pave the way for a more robust attention to detail of what is really needed, and putting that into action.
The action plan, which has evolved from a place of looking at how to improve community safety, takes a multi-agency approach, in order to "build better and more sustainable communities", as described by Minister of State at the Department of Justice, James Browne, TD.
"This city has played a pivotal role in shaping our approach to community safety," said Minister Browne of the pilot WLCSP project.
Acknowledging a lack of capital funding in Waterford, he said: "I think this is an important start for that kind of funding. We haven't seen that funding being enforced before, so we are seeing a significant increase in the type of funding we're talking about now for Local Community Safety Partnership, for projects like this action plan."
An interesting aspect of the project is that Waterford is one of a series of pilot locations for community safety wardens, with these ready and focused to commence their work in Waterford.
If successful, this action plan could be transformative, not only for the north-west suburbs of Waterford city, but as a blueprint for getting embedded in our communities and supporting them to their full potential.
