Our Services:

• Family Works Northern
• Enliven Positive Ageing Services
• Coactive Collaborative Disability Services
• Budgeting Service
• Connecting with Parishes
• Presbyterian Opportunity Shop
• PSN Foodbank

Lending a Helping Hand

A volunteers luncheon, held on the 2 March 2009, thanked all the Day Programme volunteers for their hard work.

 

“Volunteers do not necessarily have the time; they just have the heart.”

 

At the age of 81, you’d think Val Gibbons would be on the receiving end of a number of programmes provided for older people. Instead, she volunteers every second Friday as a helper at Enliven’s Pohutakawa Day Programme in Whakatane, and has been doing so for the last 16 years.

 

“I like meeting people and it gets me out of the house. Otherwise I’d just be sitting at home staring at the four walls. I think it’s what’s kept me young,” she said.

 

Val chats to other older people, helps make morning tea and sometimes goes on bus trips with them. She’s the longest-serving volunteer with the programme and has seen it move from two other venues to its current home at Knox Presbyterian Church.

 

About 40 volunteers were honoured at a special function on 2 March. The tea-makers, helpers, drivers, activity supervisors and outing organisers all got together over morning tea and lunch. Enliven’s regional manager Craig Shipton thanked them for their work and handed out certificates for long service.

 

“The volunteers do such a lot to help us, and we wanted to express our appreciation on this special occasion. It was our turn to wait on them,” said Jackie Peterson, the Pohutakawa Day service manager.

 

For more information on how to become a volunteer or about the Enliven Pohutukawa Day Programme, please contact:

 

Jackie Peterson

Enliven Pohutukawa Day Programme

83A Domain Road

Whakatane

Ph: 07 308 0055

 

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