TRANSCRIPT
Clayton Utz and The Wayside Chapel
Marcus Ross, Corporate Educator, The Wayside Chapel
Can you tell us briefly about The Wayside Chapel's work in the community?
Wayside works within our local community and we work within our community at Kings Cross. With our community in Kings Cross there are a lot of people who are marginalised, who are living on and around the streets - you know, often dealing with issues like homelessness, like mental health issues, like substance abuse. And what Wayside really offers is a safe space. We offer basic services - so subsidised food, showers, clothing, those really basic services - but it is also about a safe space where people can be supported and can be supported to take up options when and if they feel ready for that.
How does The Wayside Chapel work together with Clayton Utz?
Wayside and Clayton Utz have been involved together for a number of years now. We work together in several different ways. Recently we had a new building that went up and Clayton Utz did about 200 hours pro bono for that building project, helping us with things from the Government Funding Agreements, right through to laneway easements.
Clayton Utz also supports Wayside through the Clayton Utz Foundation and since 2009 they have been supporting the Aboriginal Project at Wayside. They were one of the initial funders for that Project and have continued to fund that Project and with almost 25% of the visitors at Wayside being Aboriginal it's been such an essential, vital project for our work and making sure that Aboriginal people at Wayside feel like they have somewhere that is culturally relevant and culturally safe.
What is one of the most recent projects that Clayton Utz and The Wayside Chapel have worked together on?
The most recent thing that Clayton Utz and Wayside have worked together on was actually Wayside getting a couple of volunteers from Clayton Utz for a day and what they were doing was actually largely administration stuff. At Wayside we have just moved into a new building and we tried to keep our services running with as little interruption as possible. But what it meant was a lot of the administration stuff does get pushed to the side. So it's invaluable help having people come in and being able to help with that backlog. We might have also had them lugging a couple of boxes as well!