Helping hand from SWBCOP: (from left) Centacare's Mandy Hogg, Carol Jackson, Tony Proud and Kris Clark with Luke Terare (at back) offer time to assist those in need

Centacare staff rallied relatives, friends and neighbours to receive and pack hundreds of kilos of fruits and vegetables two days before Christmas.

The effort gave countless homeless and disadvantaged in Brisbane a brighter festive season.

Kim and Jeremy Andrews of Daily Fresh Produce made the donation to clients of Centacare’s South West Brisbane Community Options Social Inclusion Program (SWBCOP).

SWBCOP is a part of Centacare Community Support Services.

“(We packed) 223 individual serves of fruit and vegies for people who are experiencing financial and social hardship,” said Centacare’s Kerri Lanchester.

Based in Mt Gravatt on Brisbane’s south, SWBCOP assists clients to “improve their options for greater inclusion in society”.

“Being excluded from participating fully in society is not just a problem of poverty or deprivation,” Mrs Lanchester said.

“It’s a multi-dimensional issue that encompasses all ways in which the life chance of individuals can be affected by their exclusion from the social, economic and political mainstream.”

Through government subsidies SWBCOP is able to provide “out of the box” responsive supports for a range of people.

“Support for ageing people and younger people with a disability who are indigenous, homeless and sleeping rough, people who have alcohol and substance abuse dependencies, people with mental health issues and people currently living in boarding houses who due to their personal circumstances may be at risk of homelessness,” Mrs Lanchester said.

The program “respects a person’s decision to choose to live in a particular environment”.

“Our role is to value and respect their decision by providing supports which promote a quality of life and independence for the individual,” Mrs Lanchester said.

This year SWBCOP will expand its outreach “to respond in greater detail to the ever increasing number of elderly and younger people with a disability who are sleeping rough within Brisbane and the surrounding areas”.

Their DOCS project (Direct on Street Care) will care for “the invisible and forgotten homeless”.

“(It will be for) those who aren’t sleeping in the known popular parks,” Mrs Lanchester said.

For more information or to become a corporate sponsor of SWBCOP, contact Tony Proud (Social Inclusion Program Manager) on (07) 3422 0152 or Kerri Lanchester (Service Manager) on (07) 3279 0477.


Released by The Catholic Leader