MORE THAN $18 MILLION DONATED TO COMMUNITY GROUPS

Wednesday, 30 May, 2018.

In late May, Newcastle Permanent Charitable Foundation held its first grant giving ceremony of the year which saw 15 community groups from central, western, and northern NSW receive the funding needed to bring their programs and initiatives to life.

This funding round totalled almost $800,000 and brought the total amount donated by Newcastle Permanent Charitable Foundation to its local communities to more than $18 million.

From the grants presented in this round, more than $375,000 will go directly towards improving community health and well-being, $170,000 will facilitate projects targeted as improving the lives of disadvantaged and at-risk youth, and almost a quarter of a million dollars will support the social well-being of marginalised and isolated members of the community.

Annie Miller, Director of Cancer Support at Cancer Council NSW said a $154,000 grant to develop the Transport to Treatment online booking program, was incredibly special.

“Transport to treatment is one of our key areas of need and we find that people, especially in rural and regional areas, have great difficulty getting to [cancer] treatment.

“The transport booking system will enable us to view wherever our patients are and transport them to wherever their treatment centre is; sometimes that can be hours away.

“I can’t emphasise enough how exciting this project is,” Annie said.

Andrew Stampford, Music Director at Options Theatre Company based on the Central Coast said its $50,000 grant will enable the Company to create a space that their members can really feel like is their own.

“Our goal is to put people, with varying physical and intellectual disabilities, into an environment where they can express themselves through theatre, through music, through dance—in hopefully professional capacities at some stage.

“[This] grant has given us the opportunity to really push that forward and create that proper theatre environment for them all to thrive in and learn their craft,” Andrew said.

Newcastle Permanent Charitable Foundation’s Chair, Phil Neat, said that this funding round received almost 100 applications and the quality of candidates and applications was incredibly high.

“We were extremely impressed with the projects that were presented to us for consideration and selecting the final recipients was challenging.

“The Charitable Foundation exists to provide financial support to projects and initiatives that address community disadvantage in regional NSW.

“Our Board is looking forward to working with our most recent grant recipients to see their initiatives and projects come to fruition in the next 24 months.