Sunday morning dawned and the sun shone briefly before the clouds and the crowd gathered to celebrate the culmination of twelve months work creating Guyra Community Garden.
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Jess Sisson, Youth Coordinator at The Hub at Guyra, welcomed the crowd and explained that the garden was just an idea that arose when submitting a grant application to Youth Opportunities. ‘Leading the Way’ is a two-year program funded by The Office of Communities under a Youth Opportunities Grant; the major project within the guidelines was the creation of the garden.
Nellie Blair welcomed us all to her country then Mayor Hans Hietbrink congratulated the committee for its foresight in creating such a lovely and productive space; he introduced Mr. Adam Marshall, MP who echoed everyone’s words.
Mr. Peter King, President of the Guyra Community Garden Committee, along with Mr. Marshall, cut a piece of twine to officially open the garden. Thirteen year old Janae Galindo, who designed the logo for the garden, helped Mr. Marshall cut the cake which was made, and decorated with the logo, by Mary Sisson.
There were very creative Scarecrows created for the garden with the winning one submitted by Bald blair Public School. They won a voucher from Bunnings. The Scarecrows remain in the garden for everyone to enjoy. There was a Hula Hoop competition for the children who proved they were very agile – everyone was a winner. We hope the children put their gardening gifts to good use.
The creation of this wonderful space has occurred over two years. With an idea comes a lot of work before the dream is realized and the project finalised. The Partnerships with stakeholders Guyra Shire Council, Healthy Highlanders, The Hub at Guyra, Guyra Youth at the Hub, Guyra Men’s Shed, New England Medicare Local and GALA’s New England Community College were vital in building the garden we see today. Without the donation of the space by Guyra Shire Council nothing would have been able to occur quite so smoothly. All tools and materials used in the garden were sourced from Guyra.
We are indebted to the following Guyra people and organisations for their support, advice, input and care of our project: Jess Sisson, Peter King, Ali Cairns, Nicole Corry, Beth Williams, Sue Adams, Robert Corry, Nellie Blair, Grant Corry, Campbell Wolfenden, Pamela Hart, Pam Youman from Black Mountain Nursery, Arthur Moussa from Arthur’s Handyman Services, Steve & Luke Burey, Ducats Earthmoving, Tania and Darren Lennon from Dashas Hardware, Grazag, Landmark, OCTEC and to all our stakeholders, The Guyra Argus, the Office of Communities for our Youth Opportunities grant, the ongoing support and financial contribution that NSW Sport & Recreation make and the wonderful youth of our town.
The youth who attend drop in activities at The Hub at Guyra planted the summer vegetables and already there are winter vegetable crops in the ground with the pretty Create, Inspire & Learn space a very relaxing quiet-space to catch one’s breath. Community groups might like to use the area for outdoor meetings, families could use it for picnics and there are endless other ideas. One little boy has already indicated he wants his birthday party there. The garden is now open to the Community; the Committee would like to hear from anyone who has ideas on how we move forward from here.
The founding organisations hope that the Community will take the opportunity to continue to grow the garden and become involved. Guyra Community Garden Committee meetings are held at 10.45am on the last Tuesday of the Month at The Hub at Guyra. Anyone is welcome to attend and membership is open to all. All information can be obtained from The Hub at Guyra. The Guyra Community Garden Facebook page will keep everyone up to date with any activities to be held in the garden.