Vision Motueka marks first official birthday

January 27th, 2014

The community development group Vision Motueka this week celebrates its first official birthday after a year building a solid base and mounting several successful projects.

Although the group began meeting and planning in 2012, it became a Charitable Trust in December 2012 and will host its first Annual General Meeting on Thursday, January 30th.

Being a broadly based group with no membership forms or subscriptions, Vision Motueka's informal monthly meetings are open to anyone to attend and take part in. Many good project ideas have been brought to these meetings over the past year.

The AGM will be held at Motueka Community House starting at 7.30pm, with social drinks and nibbles from 7pm and supper afterward.

In his report to the AGM, Trust board chairman David Armstrong lists the group's achievements over the period including:

Researching and Preparing a proposal to Council for a new library and community hub. A Council working party is currently considering the library part of this proposal, while the total hub concept remains an active long-term option.
Organising two large, detailed murals depicting parts of the nine-mural "Motueka story", and the project team is well placed to continue with this 5-year effort, both in raising funds and painting walls.
Helping run the Celebrating Children's Day event in March last year.
Building a Motueka Photo Library of about 150 photos which have been provided to several viewing points, including our two cinemas.
Compiling and making available online a suite of guides aimed at helping community groups get started and improve their performance. They include an online database of contact details for all community groups and clubs.
The Motueka Volunteer Awards event in October was a huge success, with much praise from those attending, strong positive reactions and excellent media coverage. The foundations are now in place to make this an annual event of some standing.
The Motueka Music Network website-based community has been running for some months now, providing a platform for people to find local music teachers and performers and see local musical events coming up.
The Community Christmas Dinner, run in partnertship with a St Andrews Parish committee, was an outstanding success, and the foundations are in place to make this an important annual event.
The Motueka Moments fortnightly Fresh FM radio show has been well received and this year will be broadcast weekly. These are 15-minute chats with people who are doing interesting, positive things in the community.
With Our Town Motueka, Vision Motueka facilitated community groups to make attractive displays in vacant shop windows, making the town look brighter and busier.

In his report David says these and other projects will continue and grow stronger in 2014, and the committee will be planning one or two other large events that will draw community groups to work together with a common purpose.

He says one new activity to work on this year will be to critique and prepare a submission for Council's Annual Plan, and to seek better engagement with the Community Board.

He feels that Motueka people are beginning to understand and hopefully appreciate the goals of the Vision Motueka group and how it is working collaboratively with other groups for the long-term benefit of the town.

"But as with so many other community groups, we face the challenge of attracting new participants in our work, especially younger people," he adds.

"There are only so many projects that our active supporters can take on, and in order to expand our activities we need some more people to join in and find how rewarding it is to get such projects off the ground and humming.

"People in the 35 to 50 age range are the future leaders of our community, and we need to get them motivated to take leadership roles starting now."

>> , to be added to the page. [If this link doesn't work, use this form instead]

[ Return ]
[ Other news articles ]

We wish to thank these local community-minded businesses who generously sponsor our site. They recognise the value of supporting this community asset, and in return Motueka Online is pleased to use and recommend their services whenever appropriate.

Ray White Motueka, Motueka Floral Studio, Nelson Building Society,
House of Travel,