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Bishop's Action Foundation - A CATALYST FOR CHANGE IN OUR COMMUNITY
From humble beginnings, the Bishop’s Action Foundation has helped hundreds of Taranaki people and community groups to flourish.
On July 7, 2005, Simon Cayley began as Chief Executive Officer of the foundation, created by Bishop Philip Richardson and a small team of dedicated people, including former Venture Taranaki CEO Stuart Trundle. There was only $100,000 in the coffers.
“I remember the first day – I was in a room at the back of Philip’s garage with a trestle table, a computer and a phone. That was the Bishop’s Action Foundation,” says Simon.
Eighteen years on, the foundation is based in Tikituterangi House, an office building in a rural setting surrounded by pigs, goats and sheep on Mangorei Rd beside the Bishop’s home. “Still humble, but they are very fit for purpose, and we have a view down the valley to the sea. I’m really proud of the workplace, our team and who we are.”
Humbleness has been a constant for the foundation. “Philip has a vision that we should really give ourselves away helping others, not make it about us. We shine the light on the people and organisations we are helping more than on ourselves,” says Simon.
Bishop Philip is patron of the foundation, which supports projects and people who are focused on making Taranaki a better place to live, and are challenging inequalities and injustices, especially of those living on the margins.
“We help people take their ideas and make them a reality… we are the catalyst for change.”
The foundation has sparked many successful community projects, including the Stratford Community House, which is a hub for social service groups. It opened in January 2011. “We led the initiative, pulled the partners together, secured funding and we created the community trust that’s run it ever since. It provides shared accommodation for not-for-profit organisations,” says Simon, whose wife Theresa is community engagement manager at the Taranaki Foundation. They have two children, aged 19 and 16. The foundation also administers the Bashford Nicholls Trust, which was originally two separate trusts. The merged trust provides scholarships for students studying agricultural or veterinary science courses. The scope has widened to include agricultural business and may extend to environmental sustainability.
Last year the trust funded 68 scholarships totalling over $250,000 and a further $50,000 went into a research and innovation award to support Taranaki. “Ultimately, we are quietly giving back to the region, even if people don’t know about us.”
Another achievement involved working with AUT to bring down community development expert Dr Love Chile to run training programmes. The foundation identified the need for such training but also realised it would be too expensive for people to attend if it was based out of the region.
Working with AUT, the foundation created a programme involving three five-day blocks of training run in Taranaki. Simon says 52 people went through the course, which was accessible, affordable and an excellent programme. “For those years we ran it, it was quite incredible. We only stopped because we ran out of people.”
One of the foundation’s greatest achievements was a collaborative effort.
Ten years ago, the BAF team helped establish The Wheelhouse, which it still manages. Aimed at empowering community organisations, The Wheelhouse was created to provide consistency and ease of access to support by entering just one door. “Community organisations come to The Wheelhouse to find all the support they need,” he says of the organisation, which has eight partners, and has been backed by funding from the Toi Foundation since its inception.
People can find training on a variety of subjects, including governance, wellbeing and innovation for community organisations, Te Tiriti o Waitangi 101, conflict resolution, and planning. It also has a massive network of facilitators, can offer one-on-one support and connect people with a mentor.
Simon says BAF was also one of the initiating partners of the Mentoring Foundation of New Zealand in 2018. “Currently there are 200 people from community organisations being mentored around the country – and 25 to 30 from Taranaki each year.”
Another achievement is the Manna Home for youth at Oakura, which the Bishop’s Action Foundation opened and runs, from behind the scenes.
Manna is a transitional home that provides a six-month live-in programme for young people, aged 16 to 21, who have experienced challenges in life. The aim, with the help from a team of five professionals, is to support tamariki to develop into healthy, resilient and independent adults. Of the six spaces available, four are referred by Oranga Tamariki and two are community placements.
“Success for the Bishop’s Action Foundation is to help people and organisations to the point where they don’t need us anymore,” says Simon, who has learnt that money isn’t always necessary to kick off ideas and projects.
“What I’m most proud of is that 18 years on we are still thriving, with a track record for making a difference for communities in the region, all from that humble trestle table beginning.”
