by Hazel Lincy Ebenezer and Matilde Newman
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We are so excited to celebrate Serve the City Gold Coast’s first event, which took place on Saturday, 26th of August. For this successful first event, 10 volunteers came together to take part in a gardening project and cleanup. We reached out to Matilde Newman, the director of STC Gold Coast, to hear more about this exciting day:
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Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and Serve the City Gold Coast?
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I am Matilde Newman, I worked with Serve the City Amsterdam for years before we moved to Australia in 2018. I’ve always had the vision in my mind to bring Serve the City to Australia and here we are, starting with a small but dedicated team. Volunteering in Australia is very regulated with lots of bureaucracy around it. I’m keen to see how Serve the City can make a difference both to the way we serve as well as the way it’s received in the city by organisations and people in need. It’ll be a bumpy road, that for sure!
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We would love to hear about your first project on Saturday, 26th of August. What was the inspiration behind this project?
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We just started posting in local community Facebook groups what we’re about and offering help. We got a lot of response and based on that we picked a date for our first event. We thought: it’ll never be perfect so we might as well get on with it. The gardening project was from a response to a Facebook post and we came up with the cleanup. It’s easy and we wanted to do something that everyone could do. With 10 volunteers we think our first day was pretty epic!
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Which STC value did you see most in action during Saturday’s event and project?
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I would say courage. It takes quite a bit of daring to be vulnerable as a beginner organisation. It’s new for everyone! And it also takes courage to invite a new and strange organisation without any established network or credibility into your life and we are so grateful for the trust people put in us this last event. It really is hopeful for the future!
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What are you excited about going forward with STC Gold Coast? How can the STC community support you?
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To discover our potential in our serving. We have only seen a glimpse, yet it’s already so encouraging. We are so excited to connect with all the different walks of life and be in the middle of a community that looks out for each other. Let’s serve together!As of support: we really struggle to put the necessary measures in place that’ll help us grow, like finance, insurance and regulatory issues. We’re keen to hear from other start-up cities how they covered their first year. How did they go about with their finances, their government requirements, their official charity registration etc etc. Especially if it’s in a country that has a lot of bureaucracy around charities and volunteering… we’d love to hear experiences!
