IN A collaboration of like-minded women, community members and service providers recently came together for Zonta Club of Wynnum Redland’s third annual Advocacy Forum.
The topic of this year’s forum on Saturday, October 12 was “homelessness”, following on from previous topics “modern slavery” and “cyber safety for teenagers”.
Key organisations and service providers were invited to present to the group, giving them the opportunity to share their work with attendees while networking with each other.
Footprints, Silky Oaks Children’s Haven, Redlands Community Services and the Night Ninjas all presented, before guest speakers from The Forgotten Women and Sharing with Friends were invited to speak.
Zonta Club service director Barbara Wills said the organisations spoke about their work in preventing homelessness from occurring.
“These groups seek to alleviate the immediate impact of homelessness and offer broad-based community involvement in various ways,” Ms Wills said.
“In some cases, it was frightening how little can mean the loss of a home and a spiralling down to poverty.
“There are a lot of people hurting and it’s got to be the role of service clubs to do what we can.”
The event was free to attend and held for advocacy purposes, although attendees were invited to donate non-perishable food items, most of which were given to Night Ninjas.
Zonta Club supports a number of local and international initiatives which align with Zonta International’s core values.
Public forums are one of a number of events held throughout the year underpinning Zonta Club’s objectives of promoting awareness of the issues around gender equality, raising community awareness, sustaining educational programs to raise awareness of respectful relationships, providing financial assistance to community organisations, helping women going through breast cancer treatment, and supporting ongoing advocacy at the United Nations and the on ground work in developing countries.
“It is part of our vision to advocate for those in need and the fastest-growing cohort of homelessness is women over 55,” Ms Wills said.
To find out more about Zonta Club of Wynnum Redland’s Inc, contact the President Ange Hill on 0400 035 391 or email wynnumredland@zontadistrict22.org.
