BLUESKIN NEWS COMMUNITY NEWSLETTER Est. 1985 FEBRUARY 2021 Seacliff • Warrington • Evansdale • Waitati • Doctors Point • Purakaunui In this issue... Waiputai Hub page 3 Dealing with life page 11 The Opera House Trust page 4 Waitati mural page 14 Ferrets and stoats page 8 Waitangi 2021 page 16 Breaking News page 10 plus lots more ... Editor’s Note Hi everyone, Happy New Year. I hope you all enjoyed a good Christmas break – though the weather was maybe not as cooperative as it could have been. As we all know, summer doesn’t really start until the schools reopen! We held the Blueskin News AGM last night. Our finances are looking good (thanks to our advertisers and donations that we received last year). Janet Rhodes has stepped down as our Chairperson due to a move away. We’d like to thank her for all her hard work and great support. Good luck for the future Janet, you’ll be missed. Mandy Mayhem- Memorial Service Bullock has taken on the role of Chairperson with Craig Marshall as Secretary, Mark and Clare Brown as Treasurers for Chuck Landis and myself as Editor. We are well supported by Ian, Giselle, A Memorial Service to celebrate Chuck’s life will Worik and Ainslie. We would, however, invite anyone be held in the Waitati Hall on Saturday 13 February interested to join our merry band - it’s not an onerous at 2.30pm. task, we meet once a month to discuss how we can All friends and colleagues of Chuck and his family are improve the BSN, what subjects we would like to see welcome to attend. included that would be of interest to the wider community and to go over the content of the next month’s issue. Just email [email protected] if you think you can spare a couple of hours a month to be part of this great local venture. Blueskin Bay Community Spaces Let’s hope that this year is not as difficult as 2020. Warrington Hall Avoiding lockdown is a goal we all need to aspire to – so Available for birthdays, family gatherings, exercise keep using the contact tracing app everywhere you go. classes, dances and do’s etc at reasonable rates. Hire includes a fully equipped kitchen and tables Enjoy this month’s read, keep safe and well – Bernie and chairs. Contact Lyn 482 2896 or Rowena 482 2667 Cover image: Nick Beckwith - white fronted tern. Waitati Hall Suitable for large meetings, weddings, parties, concerts, dances etc. (up to 120) features kitchen, toilets, stage, sound system and large projection screen. Contact Blueskin Nurseries on 482 2828 Waitati Hall Meeting Room Suitable for committee meetings, small gatherings, demonstrations etc. (up to 20 people) features kitchen and toilets. Contact Blueskin Nurseries on 482 2828 Blueskin Bay Library Meeting Room Suitable for committee meetings, presentations, training, interviews etc. (up to 12 people) features modular tables, large projection screen, kitchenette and toilets. Contact Blueskin Bay Library 482 2444 | [email protected] Waiputai Hub Warm and cosy meeting space, community gatherings, classes, children’s parties, and workshops for up to 20 people. Features include small kitchen, comfy couches, tables and chairs, fenced grounds including playground for under 5s and toilets. Available to hire for workshops, courses, children’s parties or family events etc. at a reasonable hourly rate. Booking enquiries to [email protected] or Nancy 482 1198 Hire charge is usually applicable, details can be obtained on request 2 | February 2021 Waiputai Hub Supporting a healthy, strong, inclusive, connected and sustainable Blueskin Community. Both Kinds of Music Announcing the opening of a repurposed Touted as a classic, The Blues Brothers movie was embroidered with one-liner gold. Along with the stand- community space in the heart of Warrington, out, “we like both kinds of music – country and western”, serving the immediate and wider Blueskin Bay there were nuggets such as, “what’s the chicken-wire (Waiputai) area. for?”, and then the premise laden, “we’re on a mission With the sad closure of the Warrington Playcentre a from God”. Well, this past week, I witnessed both kinds of conversation was started as to how to keep the building music and they were neither country nor western. active for our community. The not for profit Waiputai First, I was at The Pioneer Hall in Port Chalmers, that Trust was formed and the lease of the building through quaint suburb over the hill from Waitati which, let’s be the DCC as a Community Hub was secured. honest, would be far more charming without the port. The Hub offers a warm, friendly space for community (Logs anyone?) Pumping out tunes were three bands groups, by gold coin donation from participants. whose members, aged 15-16, were celebrating the end of the school year with typical youthful exuberance, and the It is available to hire for workshops, courses, children’s word which immediately sprang to mind was punk. The parties or family events etc at a reasonable hourly rate. sound, the look, the attitude. The audience, the low-fi It can also be hired in conjunction with the hall offering tech, the po-going. All of it – punk. It was 1978 again and extra space for larger events. I loved it. I couldn’t decipher many of the lyrics but this Maybe you have been thinking of a group you’d like to was punk so angry protest would seem assured. host but didn’t have a venue? Fast forward a few days and I’m at the Waitati Community Maybe you need a space to give classes to small groups? Hall for the local Playcentre’s annual fund-raiser dance. That’s right, a dance. Not a dance party. Competently We would love to hear from you with a proposal or pumping out cover tunes by the likes of Pink Floyd and booking. Enquiries by email to [email protected] The Rolling Stones was a band of merry men in their Starting in February mid 70’s. OMG it was 1978 again, again. I understand The Tuesday Coffee Mornings 9.30–11.30am open coffee Rolling Stones may not have reprised much lyrical anger mornings. Open to all, coffee and company,. gold coin or protest, but their lives and relationships with 1970’s society certainly did. And Pink Floyd’s concept album The donation. Dark Side of The Moon, dissected a repressive 70’s society Thursday Lunch Group 12-1.30pm – For people working and is an album which holds a special place in music’s remotely from home. Hot drinks and companionship. chronology of protest and anger. Bring your own lunch. Gold coin donation. So – music makers from 15 to 75 years old, while Coming soon seemingly at opposite ends of the musical spectrum, Darts Club – Details to be confirmed. Open to all to, learn displayed far more in common than was immediately and hone your skills in company. Date and time to be apparent. And no doubt both ends of this spectrum are confirmed. convinced that they, just like The Blues Brothers’ Jake and Ellroy, are on a mission from God. Art Classes – watch this space. Doug Nuttall Nancy Higgins February 2021 | 3 The Opera House Trust The Opera House Trust has been a home and We have been talking to housing agencies and will talk refuge for heaps of people over the last 20 years, to more to find good partners for this project who are many still here in Waitati and Dunedin. It was committed to social housing in Waitati. formed in 1998 as a private charitable trust from We have to clear the DIY structures. We have been a very generous donation of land from Gary quoted $35,000 for that work and it will likely be more, Pearson and included the Opera House itself especially if there are hazardous materials in any of the built by Bruce Sheppard. The trust is tasked dangerous structures. The front section needs a lot of with supporting low income people and families work to clear and restore and we need to make Lake with healthy food and accommodation, and to Beatrice safe if families are to use that area. We need to completely redo the drainage, sewerage and electricity promote native regeneration. The trust owns infrastructure on the property if we are to put any three sections on Doctors Point Rroad, two are modern housing units or even just park tiny homes on residential and one is coastal, facing the estuary. it. Then we still have to sort the building and resource We are governed by our trust deed and because consents if we want to have low income rentals and work we are a private trust we don’t have AGM’s as with partners to manage the costs. That is really positive some groups do. for the future but will take a lot of work to get there. For most of the past 20 years the trust has provided So we are tackling this one step at a time. accommodation at the Opera House, the White House We have given our current tenants four months notice and in the DIY structures built by Glen Monaghan (Jack to May 2021. That is incredibly hard for them, we know, Black). The trust has had a long and sometimes difficult and they have been great tenants over the years. The history but the trust aims have always been the driving two houses are degrading faster than we can repair purpose of the current and previous trustees. The current them and they have to be retired this year.