Council announces appointment of Te Puru Park Facility trustees

Manukau City Council has confirmed the appointment of nine trustees to the newly formed Te Puru Community Charitable Trust.

The Trust’s work will include supporting, promoting, and delivering programmes and initiatives to provide for the cultural, recreational and other community needs of the Clevedon community, and in particular the Te Puru community facility.

Expressions of interest were sought from the community in April 2002 and applications for trustee positions closed in May 2002. Manukau City Council received 14 applications for 9 positions.

Mayor Sir Barry Curtis says that the calibre of the nominations was extremely pleasing. “We’ve selected an excellent group of enthusiastic people to drive the initiative forward. They will be continuing on from the fund raising efforts initiated by the community back in 1985. The project has been beset with problems and a review of the project was undertaken in 1997. Council has now made a significant financial commitment to the project and wishes to see it completed.

“The Te Puru Park facility will now be operated under the auspices of a trust and there is a strong feeling of energy and renewal with the new trustees coming on board.”

It is anticipated that the trust will work towards leveraging additional financial support for the project and on making the project sustainable one over time. Mayor Curtis hopes that they will be able to engage individual residents and businesses of Manukau to play their part in contributing to a thriving community facility.

“I am enthused about the passion and commitment of the new trustees and wish them well,” he says.

The nine Trustees are:

Kelvin Griffin – is a member the Maraetai Boating Club and has a strong background in sales and marketing, small business consultancy and project management. Grant Fox – A resident of Beachlands and a well known sporting personality not only within New Zealand but respected world-wide. Grant sits on two other trusts and brings this trust experience to the team. Graeme Leggat – Past chairman of the Clevedon Community Board, Trustee of the Whitford Community Trust, life member of the Howick Pakuranga Cricket Club and a comes from a Civil and Environmental Engineering background as well as being a company director. Brian Gower – Is well known to the community as the Beachlands Primary School principal. Brian has a passion for education and has also published a book on “Second Language Teaching for Japanese teachers of English John Bennion – Has been a Maraetai resident since 1984 and a committee member of Maraetai Bowls, Ratepayers Association and vice president of the Pohutukawa Coast Probus Club. John also has a strong background in construction, project management and engineering Lynette Tischhauser – Has been involved with the Beachlands Boating Club and has strengths in credit control, administration, sales and the food industry. Logan Kemp – Has been a Maraetai resident for over 30 years. He is a member of the Maraetai Residents and Ratepayers Association, Maraetai Boating Club and Clevedon Community Board. Hugh Martin – Is a member of the Bucklands Beach Yacht Club and has strengths in mechanical engineering, project management and business leadership.

Gary Laing – Has a long association with Maraetai and is a member of the Australian Institute of Packaging and is a Quality Assurance Manager.

It is anticipated that the operations of the Trust will begin in February 2003.

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