Community Spirit Forum

Parramatta Lord Mayor Clr David Borger gained the support of Parramatta City Council to promote the concept of Community Spirit within the Parramatta community using a variety of strategies.

As part of this initiative, a survey was undertaken to better understand the way Community Spirit is perceived in the Parramatta community. The survey was undertaken via contact with 214 members of Parramatta City Council’s Resident’s Panel and asking them a series of questions relating to the issue of Community Spirit.

Following the survey, a Community Spirit Forum was held on Monday November 27, 2006 at Parramatta Town Hall. The purpose of the Forum was to explore the concept of Community Spirit and to identify some strategies to take forward. PCC specifically did not want to take ownership of the concept of Community Spirit, but to have the concept and strategies generated and owned by the various communities.

Participants in the Forum were selected from the Residents Panel, Community Leaders as identified by PCC’s CCB team and from selected community service providers known to PCC. About 80 people were invited and about 40 people attended.

In the World Café activity, participants sat randomly on 5 tables. Participants on the tables had a conversation addressing the question “What does the idea of Community Spirit mean to you?”. The hosts ensured that people around their table introduced themselves to each other, and recorded the main ideas that came from their group.

After 5 minutes, conversations around the tables were wound up and all participants moved to another table. The hosts at the tables facilitated new introductions and documented the discussions. After another 5 minutes, the participants moved tables one more time. The aim was to ensure that the people in the room got to know as many other participants as possible and had the opportunity to discuss their ideas about Community Spirit as widely as possible, as well as learning from others.

The ideas generated that were documented by table hosts were displayed at the end of the World Café session so participants could get an overall sense of the ideas of the whole Forum.

The ideas were later analysed and summarised as follows:

• neighbours speaking to one another and community members engaging with one other more frequently;
• community activities that provide opportunities for sharing and get to know neighbours and community members. Suggestions included cooking, gardening, sports, street parties, volunteering, community clean ups, disaster recovery programs.
• community spaces for specific groups to gather and interact. These groups included children, young people and older people;
• people trusting one another more so suspicion and negativity are reduced;
• people understanding and respecting cultural difference;
• people looking out for each other, offering, and being able to ask for, help in crises;
• people feeling safe in their communities;
• improved access for all;
• communication hubs in communities so people knew where to get information;
• opportunities for partnerships between communities and local businesses.

Following a presentation by Lord Mayor Clr David Borger a case study on the very successful Guildford Community Garden was presented to the Forum by local residents John Koch and Daniel Muthia. This presentation focussed on how the Guildford Community Garden over 5 years has built connections in the local community across different cultures, beliefs, ages and abilities. This served as a great example of how community spirit in action can make a real difference to both individuals and communities of interest.

After the two presentations, the participants were asked to move into planning groups based around Wards. Each group brain-stormed project ideas for their area and presented these back to the group. The CCB team will be following up on these potential projects early in 2007.