22 October, 2015

Wellington grant recipients cover a wide variety of causes

More than $70,000 of grants were awarded at a grants function in Wellington on Monday night to a wide variety of social causes.

The event was part of Nikau Foundation’s annual grant-making process and the recipients were awarded grants from the Tindall Foundation through Nikau Foundation. Nikau is a funding manager for the Tindall Foundation in the Wellington region. The awards were presented by Nikau Foundation administration manager Brian Burge.

In receiving the grant, Amanda Calder from the Refugee Family Reunification Trust said that the grant goes toward airfares and other essential costs of family reunification. She said it allowed refugees who had not seen their families, in some cases for many years, to finally be reunited safely in Wellington. Amanda quoted the words of one refugee who received assistance who said: “Your help will change my life and the life of my family”.

Catriona Ferguson from the New Zealand Book Council said the money from the grant would be used for their Writers in Schools programme. She said that the programme engages readers of the future, and for the writers, it means they get in front of a live audience. She said they hope to get New Zealanders to read more and to especially read more books by New Zealand authors.

Lance Hurly from the Upper Hutt Foodbank said the Foodbank had given out 1,400 parcels of food this year and fed more than 4,500 people. He said that a community can be judged by how it treats its most vulnerable citizens and in that respect, Upper Hutt is a very caring society.

“Nikau and Tindall Foundations were amongst the few organisations willing to make grants available to Foodbanks to buy food,” he said.

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