Groups to gather for governance event

A NETWORKING event for the region’s community groups is being held later in the year courtesy of the Ballarat East Neighbourhood House.

The free Connecting and Learning Together: Where does the money come from? initiative is slated for 20 November from 5.30pm at Morshead Park.

For BENH, it will mark the first official gathering opportunity for groups and non-profits following the neighbourhood house’s community governance program.

“We’ve had informal networking from people who’ve been coming to workshops and we thought we’d bring everyone together for a more formal event,” said BENH community governance officer Kay Miller.

“As the tagline suggests, it’s about people who’ve been successful in raising funds for community groups and sharing with others how they’ve done it.”

Through the community governance project, workshops have been regularly held with guest speakers presenting on subjects like PR and marketing, mediation, collaboration, and volunteerism.

The networking event has been supported with nearly $2000 from Community Bank Buninyong.

Guest speakers will include program alumni Ballarat Tool Library’s Greg Jakob, Ballarat Foundation’s Andrew Eales, and Food is Free’s Lou Ridsdale as well as debuting presenter Clare O’Connor from Ballarat Repair Cafe. “They’re all very active in the fundraising space,” Ms Miller said.

“The repair cafe has a lot of donations, the tool library raises funds through memberships, Lou and her crew do relationships with businesses, and Andrew’s going to talk on online fundraising.”

The community governance program is being funded into June next year. To register, visit the BENH website.