City of Kingston Senior΄s Newsletter November 2020 In this edition 1 Love where you live 5 Cheltenham Community Centre 1 Woman of the Year Award 5 Chelsea Heights Community Centre 2 Mordialloc Rotary Club 5 Longbeach Place Inc. in Chelsea 3 Stavroula Bezas – a Community Leader and Poet 5 Highett Neighbourhood Community House 3 Italian Social Club City of Moorabbin 6 Services and Programs 4 Technology helps us to stay connected 8 Kingston AccessCare 4 Kingston Libraries Online Programs Merry Christmas! Happy Festive Season! Happy New Year! Kingston Council would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas, Happy Festive Season and good health, happiness and prosperity in 2021. Love where you live Woman of the Year Award Help make a real difference in shaping Kingston, The City of Kingston is seeking nominations for by telling us what matters most to you in your Kingston Woman of the Year Award 2021. neighbourhood. Nominees should be leaders in their field, who Kingston Council Complete the inspire others and make a difference to our has partnered survey to go into community through their exceptional achievements. the running for $100 with independent ONLINE SHOPPING Nominations close Monday 30 November 2020. one of ten $100 online VOUCHERS The Award winner will be announced at Kingston’s research agency shopping vouchers! Place Score to International Women’s Day ceremony on Friday conduct a city- 5 March 2021. wide Neighbourhood Liveability Study. We want to To be eligible, nominees must: understand what matters most to you, and the wider • Be a woman or individual who identifies as female community, to help us to plan Kingston’s future. • Be aged 16 years and above Results from the Neighbourhood Liveability Study • Live, work or study within the City of Kingston will help shape our next Council Plan and 4-year • Positively influence the changing social, vision for Kingston, which are both due to be environmental or business landscape and be released in 2021. Community feedback will also help leaders (or emerging leaders) in their field. Council to identify priority areas for investment. We encourage nominations from any community Take part for 4 weeks, from Wednesday member or community group/organisation. 4 November until Wednesday 2 December, For more information please visit at yourkingstonyoursay.com.au kingston.vic.gov.au or 1300 653 356. 1 Kingston Clubs and their Members Mordialloc Rotary Club The Rotary Club of Mordialloc has a proud history of 49 years of community service. The members have a wide range of business, professional and community experience and they put Don Butler with other Rotarians cleaning up at Parkdale Railway this to use in the Club’s many projects and programs. Station in 2010. This year, during lockdown, the members of the Club have come up with new ideas and methods to Mordialloc Rotary support our community. Emergency care packages of non-perishable goods Club and Don Butler have been put together to assist people in crisis. Food and personal hygiene products have been donated and Roydon (Don) Butler joined the Rotary numerous packages have been distributed throughout Club of Mordialloc in 1989. our community via City of Kingston, Victoria Police Apart from a period working in Malaya, and other local charitable organisations. Don spent most of his working life with The Club has also continued to support the City of the Postmaster General’s Department, the Kingston’s Rental Assistance Program, which offers forerunner of Telstra and Australia Post. help to those in need in our local area. He has lived in the Mordialloc and Parkdale President Paul Taranto has led a push to support areas for most of his life, attending Mordialloc local businesses and the Club has injected funds by Beach Primary School in the 1930s. purchasing gift vouchers from traders and sharing During recent years, Don has been involved in their stories through the Club Facebook page. The an assisted reading program for students at vouchers have been used as prizes for club raffles the School and has entertained many of the and social trivia evenings held online. participants with stories of growing up in the area. Funds have been raised to be distributed to those in During his 31-years as an active member of need through the making and sale of face masks, Mordialloc Rotary, Don has been an enthusiastic the sale of honey from a local beekeeper, and an volunteer and participant in all the club’s auction of an extensive guitar collection donated by programs and projects, including the Annual a Club member. Art Show, Jumble Sale, and the Beautification The Club has supported a number of projects including Project at Parkdale Railway Station. ‘End Trachoma 2020’, which supports Australia’s The Parkdale Station project was instigated by Indigenous communities, helping to prevent the spread Don who lives in nearby Bethell Avenue and of this debilitating eye disease. Also, ‘Wheelchairs for had been concerned about the appearance Kids’, an Australian not-for-profit organisation that of the station and its surrounding vegetation. manufactures and distributes wheelchairs to disabled After persistent negotiation by Don with children in under-resourced countries. Over recent Council, rail and other authorities, Mordialloc years, the Club has provided funds for the purchase Rotary carried out the first of many working of over 50 wheelchairs. bees to remove rubbish, weeds and other A major event the Club runs is the Gnome and Fairy debris in 2010. The Club also planted shrubs to Festival held annually in March. The Club is preparing beautify the area. While well into his 80s when to hold it again in 2021 should circumstances allow. this project began, Don organised and led the Club’s working bees over the next six years. 2021 is a special year for the Club as it celebrates the 50th anniversary of its foundation. The year also In 1992-93 Don took on the role of Secretary for marks 100 years of Rotary in Australia, which will be Rotary District 9810 when another Club member, celebrated nationwide in April. the late Don Holderness, was District Governor. The Rotary Club of Mordialloc is open for new Don has also been awarded a Life Membership memberships. For more information, please visit at the Mordialloc Sailing Club where he was an mordiallocrotary.org.au active participant for over 30 years. facebook.com/rotaryclubofmordialloc/ [email protected] 2 Kingston Clubs and their Members Stavroula Bezas – a Community Leader and Poet! Stavroula has been volunteering for the community for more than 20 years. One of her greatest achievements is a blossoming seniors’ club – Lemnian Community of Victoria Seniors Group. Stavroula was a foundation Thanks to her efforts some not-for- member and she has been the profit welfare organisations receive Secretary since its establishment. regular donations, including Cancer She is responsible for Club’s Council Victoria. documentation, organising of its Stavroula is highly regarded for activities and preparation of the her community work and for her traditional Greek morning tea and commitment to Greek cultural lunch and is supported by a great heritage. In 2004 she represented team of Committee members. the Federation of Aegean Sea Prior to COVID the Club had Islands of Melbourne at a Forum approximately 200 members with in Thessaloniki, Greece. She also 130 attending regularly. led a student exchange program For many years Stavroula has also between Melbourne and the been working as Secretary of the Greek island of Lemnos. This Ladies Committee at the Lemnian initiative was funded by the Greek Community of Victoria. She is government to enable Australian involved in organising special events born children to learn about the “Between Two Countries” Book Cover. including Mothers’ Day, Fathers’ country of their grandparents. Day, and Greek Independence Day Australia. The book was published Despite her busy schedule, in Australia and Greece with the which are open to the families of Stavroula worked as a volunteer Club members and the greater Federal Minister for Cultural Affairs visitor at Fronditha Aged Care acknowledging her work and a Lemnian community. These inter- Home where she read poetry, generational events create great special program on SBS produced books and newspapers to Greek as part of the launch. opportunities for younger speaking residents. community members to learn During COVID Stavroula has started about their cultural heritage and In 2019 Stavroula published her working on her second book! strengthen relationships within first book, Between Two Countries. It is a collection of poems in which We wish her every success with and across the broader Australian– her next publication and the vital Greek community. she shares memories and images of her beloved island, Lemnos, community work she and her Stavroula is passionate about and her happiness of living in team undertake. fundraising for those in need. Italian Social Club City of Moorabbin – letter from the Secretary As we struggle through the COVID-19 virus, we are wondering what our world will be like after returning to our normal old ways? It makes me think of all those culture in clubs, where they could elderly people of many different get together in an atmosphere During COVID Tom spends a lot of time on nationalities, those who came of music, dances, songs and gardening. here many years ago, those who wonderful dinners enjoyed together I would like to say to all of us that worked hard, raised their families, with old and new friends and where life is always full of surprises and and now, being older and more they could share memories from hopes. When all returns to normal fragile, are wondering what to do their home countries. we must all get back to sing, dance, for the rest of their lives.