Neighbourhood Houses’ pre-election funding campaign

Neighbourhood Houses are the ‘Heart of the Community’ – walk to support them!

Victoria’s Association of Neighbourhood Houses & Learning Centres (ANHLC) has run a very successful campaign for realistic funding and now the upcoming State election gives them a perfect opportunity to finish off all their hard work, respond to community needs, and get houses open 5 days and funded for an average of 35 hours for all those who need it.

What is the Walk of Hearts?
The Walk will be a statewide effort linking all Neighbourhood Houses in a Victoria-wide web representing the community connectedness achieved by and through Neighbourhood Houses. It will provide opportunities for every local community to publicly express the importance of their Neighbourhood House.

Each House will be sent a ‘heart’ printed with their House name and location. Houses can link with the heart of their communities and walk ‘their heart’ to the Treasury Gardens, Melbourne, on Thursday, 14 September.

Statewide local Walk of Hearts events
The local events are a representation of the ‘House Heart’ starting its journey from its home and travelling to Treasury Gardens. These local events around the state are planned from Monday 28 August to Wednesday 13 September.

The purpose
ANHLC wants a mass of House Hearts to ‘arrive’ at Treasury Gardens and be ‘planted’ in the ground inside a massive replica of the house heart logo. The strength of the Association’s state wide Walk will be ‘driven home’ to both politicians and the media.

NB Stakes for planting the hearts will be available at Treasury on the day.

The arrival of the Walk of Hearts at Treasury Gardens
‘House Hearts’ will have ‘walked’ and reached their final destination where the ‘Heart of Victorian communities’ will be collectively entrusted to Local Members when placed in the replica of the logo.

600 – 700 people (2 people per House or Centre or 40 people per Network) are needed at Treasury Gardens to make a strong visual statement that will attract the media and reinforce the message that people are collectively committed and passionate about seeing the whole campaign through to completion.

Details
Date: Thursday 14 September
Time: 12 noon – 2pm
Place: Treasury Gardens
Optional Dress: Wear one of the House logo colours (blue or orange) or both!!

Resource materials
Postcards, posters and the community’s ‘House Heart’ to bring to Melbourne will all be distributed soon.

Organisers say this will be a very concentrated campaign of 3-4 weeks planning and activity. It will mean some work but can also be a fun way to run a local community campaign together.

For more info email Louise, the Walk Coordinator mailto:ANHLCWalk@anhlc.asn.au