THERE are 142 Neighbourhood Watch groups in New South Wales. Several are in Hornsby, Ku-ring-gai, and Willoughby.
Neighbourhood Watch helps neighbours help each other. Now, Neighbourhood Watch needs your help, in the form of a corporate sponsor, or several corporate sponsors chipping in. New South Wales is the only state or territory of Australia without government assistance to Neighbourhood Watch.
With the state coming out of lockdown, Neighbourhood Watch groups are chomping at the bit to convene local activities in person. For many communities, life won’t feel back to normal without local Neighbourhood Watch events.
Stalls, barbecues, and other gatherings educate people and make communities safer. They also bring communities together: men, women, and children.
Neighbourhood Watch depends on volunteers contributing their time and skills, but some things can’t be volunteered. The biggest expense for Neighbourhood Watch NSW is public liability insurance.
To convene activities in person, local Neighbourhood Watch groups need Neighbourhood Watch NSW to have public liability insurance. Without that insurance, local Neighbourhood Watch groups can only operate on-line, as they did through the lockdown.
Sponsorship of Neighbourhood Watch NSW helps all the groups across New South Wales. Many more neighbourhoods are hoping to establish groups.
In 2019, NSW Police handed management of Neighbourhood Watch NSW to the people. The New South Wales government provided a one-off grant to Neighbourhood Watch NSW to pay for public liability insurance for one year only.
Since 2019, Neighbourhood Watch NSW has tried hard but been unable to obtain a corporate sponsor to pay for public liability insurance. In 2020, Board members, all of them volunteers, personally paid the cost of public liability insurance.
The Neighbourhood Watch NSW website www.nhwnsw.org.au. Ready to discuss the benefits to sponsors of such a well-known brand is David Watmore, the Secretary, at 02 4048 1068 and on email admin@nhwnsw.org.au.
Ready to talk about local sponsorship of Neighbourhood Watch in Hornsby and Ku-ring-gai are Julia Eagles and Simon Lennon at nhwkuringgaihornsby@gmail.com, both in Gordon.