Useful contacts over the festive period 2023-2024 BRISBANE

Woman sitting at office desk speaking on phone

Brisbane’s Community Development network have released a list of useful contacts and hours of operation over the holiday period, including:

  • Free community Christmas meals
  • Christmas hampers/gifts/food parcels
  • Housing assistance
  • Emergency contacts

Useful contacts over festive period 2023-2024

An idea to support women at risk of homelessness wins Ventures Industry Challenge

An idea to support women at risk of homelessness wins Ventures Industry Challenge

An idea to support women aged 50+ at risk of homelessness in Queensland has taken out the top prize and $5,000 at the 2023 Ventures Industry Challenge . Co-founder of GreenDoor Claire Ashman pitching at the pitch final Women over 55 are now one of the fastest-growing groups at risk of homelessness in Australia, with recent research indicating that without intervention the number of homeless older women in Queensland will double in the next decade.

This year’s challenge was in collaboration with innovation partners, Q Shelter, BHC Creating Liveable Communities, YFS, and Challenge DV.

Click here to view original web page at ventures.uq.edu.au

Tents handed out to shelter homeless dumped by Brisbane City Council

Outrage as council dumps tents given to homeless as shelter

Brisbane City Council workers have sparked outrage for disposing of tents supposed to help house the city’s homeless community just days after they were given out. It’s believed five tents were recently removed by council officers at Cathedral Place.

Northwest Community Group president Paul Slater, who organises and distributes supplies to those experiencing homelessness, told 7 News he had spoken to the council who confirmed “they’d thrown them into landfill”.

Click here to view original web page at 7news.com.au

Brisbane planning laws keeping poor out of city’s most desirable suburbs, research suggests

Brisbane planning laws keeping poor out of city’s most desirable suburbs, research suggests

Brisbane city council’s traditional building character overlay prohibits demolition of any dwelling built before 1947 in a bid to ‘maintain traditional character’. Planning laws that preserve most prewar Brisbane homes are “tantamount to exclusionary zoning”, keeping poor people out of rich suburbs without substantially preserving the city’s built heritage, according to new research.

The lead author, Rachel Gallagher, said the city’s character-zoning laws were justified as a means to preserve heritage – but in reality prevent higher-density housing being built in some of the city’s most desirable suburbs such as Chelmer, Morningside, Ashgrove, Paddington, Bulimba and Bardon.

 

Click here to view original web page at www.theguardian.com

How the housing crisis will reshape SEQ’s new and old suburbs

How the housing crisis will reshape SEQ’s new and old suburbs

How do you design a suburb in 2023 to include social housing, affordable housing, be close to public transport, increase density, mesh with the existing community and not send developers broke? Does housing design differ between greenfield locations, where there is no existing layout or infrastructure, and established suburbs where there are already homes, shops, schools, parks – and any problems are entrenched?

Brisbane Times has taken a look at south-east Queensland’s newest suburb, Lilywood, in Caboolture West (now called Waraba), and we have asked industry experts how they would deliver new homes in established suburbs.

Click here to view original web page at www.brisbanetimes.com.au

Freshwater eel totem installed in the Spring Hill Reconciliation Garden

In December 2022 Q Shelter had a bronze Freshwater eel totem installed into it’s garden.

The totem was funded by the Gambling Community Benefit Fund and will shortly have the following story installed to accompany the totem.

Story by Uncle Joe Kirk  |  Design by Wendy McNeil  |  Bronze casting Chalkos Fine Arts Foundry

This country is river country and the freshwater eel is one of the totems of mother earth.

Freshwater eel mothers leave the estuaries in May/April in the early morning and head to Moreton Bay via the Brisbane River to lay their eggs. The mothers know when it’s time to leave.

When they arrive they find a safe place to lay their eggs travelling through the grass when it’s wet with dew. They shine and look like a rainbow.

Then the mothers all die.  100’s of them.  They all die out in Moreton Bay in the weeds.

The eggs will hatch just before December each year and grow to be white fingerlings. The babies start swimming and nature tells them where their mother comes from.

By the time they swim up into the estuaries they’re a good size, like a little snake.  They arrive back to their estuary with all the other eels… They swim around like crazy because they are all back together.

“Come here boy, come here girl, you are part of us.  You belong here.”

The Freshwater eel is part of our stolen generation story.

Useful contacts over the Christmas period 2022 – 2023

The Central Interagency Network have compiled a useful list of contacts for those experiencing housing stress in the Brisbane region over the 2022 – 2023 holiday period.