Apex was formed in Geelong in 1931, it was three young men who wanted to make a contribution to their community in the face of the Great Depression. Apex grew quickly throughout Australia, particularly in rural areas, you’d be hard pressed to travel through the small towns in our country without finding an Apex park. Once established, the clubs set about working to improve their local communities in ways that only they as locals could.

When I first joined Apex I was informed by an older member, bearing in mind that in those days members were retired at age 40, that we were there to fill in the gaps. . What we did was see the problems that bureaucracies could not and find solutions that they would not. This philosophy was repeated by thousands of local clubs across the nation, and collectively it was organisations like ours who changed the country. Apex bought the first guide dog trainers to Australia in 1957, started Australian research into Autism in 1968, helped to create the Foundation 41 Research Unit in 1972, funded SIDS research in the early 1980s, along with dozens of other achievements. Other service organisations have similar stories to tell.

But just as important as our collective national efforts were the things these clubs gave to their local communities. Not just the parks and monuments, but the help that they gave to people who didn’t have somewhere else to turn. Over the years our club has chopped firewood for widows, provided holidays for institutionalised orphans, thrown Christmas parties for new migrants, helped maintain accommodation for the homeless and provided equipment for everyone from the local rescue squad to a school for the disabled. While we are lucky today that our social services are so much better resourced than in the past, I worry that it has an impact on our commitment to our local communities when so many people look firstly to different levels of government to solve problems that are within our own abilities to deal with.

There is a well understood psychological effect that people regard things more highly when they have had to make some effort to obtain them, when we work hard to achieve something we appreciate it and care for it much more than if it is simply given to us. This isn’t just the case for individuals but for communities as well, many of the things we value the most are those that were achieved despite a lack of outside assistance. How do we engage people in building their communities’ civic resources when the process is owned by local councils or government departments? How can we make a disengaged community value the programs and infrastructure that is then provided for them?

Thanks to a combination of drought and maintenance problems our fountain hasn’t run very often over the past few years, but it’s the redevelopment of the open space in the CBD that has consigned it to demolition, it no longer fits the Council’s plans for how this space should be presented and used. So the gift that these service clubs made to our town will shortly be removed, and no doubt with it part of the memory of their contribution.

This is being repeated throughout small towns in Australia, community assets which were built by local volunteers are being dismantled by councils that no longer want to maintain them, and sadly in many cases the organisations that contributed these things to their community are no longer around to have a say. In many small towns the service clubs were a big part of the social fabric of the community, they created bonds between the families involved, provided services and support for others and helped to build a culture of civic participation. I remember when I travelled throughout the countryside as a child there would be signs at the entrance to every town proudly displaying the list of local clubs and where and when they met, for the benefit of travelling members and for new residents looking to connect with people.

Sadly those signs are few and far between these days, as are the clubs they represented. The decline in participation hasn’t just affected our organisation, similar stories are told by Rotary, Lions, the Country Women’s Association and other service clubs. As the clubs fade, the halls, parks, monuments and memories of their contribution also tend to be neglected. I think that we are losing a lot more than fountains and swing sets though, we are losing some of our sense of self reliance and of community ownership.

Saturday morning we have a second hand book sale in QEII square, books are one dollar each or you can grab a shopping bag full for five dollars.

Sunday morning we’ll be at the finish line of the Nail Can Hill Run selling sausage sandwiches and burgers. All of our meat comes from the award winning Morrison Street Butchers, so it’s super tasty.

Two great opportunities for you to support your local Apex Club.

A few months ago I turned my thoughts to finding something else that the Club could do for this community. The program co-ordinator from Vinnies was really grateful to hear from the Club again and when I asked her what we could do to help out she responded, “Well they’ve never seen the snow”. This wasn’t a particularly surprising observation, given that the bulk of the families were from Sudan, but it seemed like the sort of challenge that our Club could handle.

After a few logistical setbacks, today we managed to take thirty new settlers to Mount Buffalo to see snow for the first time in their lives. I don’t think that I can really express what it was like to share the joy that they felt, but I do know that the deep sense of satisfaction that I have right now will certainly carry me for some time. Photos of the trip over the fold.

I cannot begin to imagine how this must be affecting his family, I just hope that they can find some solace in this difficult time.

In the 1950s the Bonegilla migrant camp, approximately twenty kilometres outside of Albury, was one of the major stepping off points for post war migrants coming to Australia. During this time the Apex Club of Albury held an annual Christmas pageant for the camp’s children, organising visits from Santa and bags of sweets. During the time it operated 320,000 migrants moved through the Bonegilla camp, so many thousands of families received a small gesture of welcome from the Apex Club of Albury.

This year we, in a small way, revived that tradition by hosting some newly settled families from the local community at our own kids Christmas Party. This traditional social event in our Club’s calendar, where all of the members’ kids get an opportunity to spend some time together and receive a visit from Santa, seemed a perfect fit for newly settled families who are looking to build a life in this country.

I started making calls back in September to various groups who I thought might be able to put us in touch with some families and was lucky enough to be contacted by Jane Pope from the Multicultural Council of Wagga Wagga. I explained a little about Apex to Jane and told her what I had in mind. The criteria that I gave to Jane was as follows, we wanted families with children of a similar age range to those in our Club and for whom a Christmas celebration would be culturally appropriate.
Jane understood what we were aiming to do right away and started looking for appropriate families.

I had spoken to the Club Board about my plans, but had not spoken yet to the members as a whole, and while I was confident that most people would be happy with the plan I realised that there may be a bit of resistance to interfering with one of our traditional social events. As it turned out the Club overwhelmingly supported the idea and approved a budget to buy presents for all of the children that we were hosting.

Jane found four families, with fourteen children in total, who were willing to come to our Christmas party and provided us with a list of the children’s names, ages and gender so that we could buy suitable gifts for them. Jane also organised volunteers from a refugee support group in Albury to transport the families to and from our party, as most of them either do not have cars or do not have a driver’s license. The families originally came from Sudan, Togo and Ethiopia and are all now permanent residents, living in Albury.

It was amazing to see these gregarious kids mixing with our own, joining in the fun with our visiting clown, playing cricket and soccer and of course anxiously awaiting to see what they would receive from Santa. Most of these children had spent their entire lives in refugee camps in the African desert, so getting presents from a cheery guy in a red suit was a marked contrast to their previous Christmases.

Speaking with the parents was an eye opener for many of our Club’s members. It is almost impossible to understand the trials that these people have been through to build a better life for themselves until you have heard it first hand. I can honestly say that the Apexians gained as much from our guests as we gave to them. The consensus amongst the members was that we should definitely repeat the event next year.

The day after the event I had one of our members ring me, bursting with ideas about what more we could do to help these families settle into our community and perhaps even, when they had found their feet, become members of our club. He described the Christmas party as “the most meaningful thing I’ve done in Apex.” and it was amazing to hear his new found enthusiasm.

Talking with the families and the volunteers from the Sanctuary group it was clear that one of the biggest things that these new settlers need is for people to give their time to teach them the basics of Australian life. Mowing a lawn, changing a light bulb or a tap washer are all things that we take for granted, but are skills that these families have never been exposed to. Hopefully in the new year the Apex Club of Albury can build on the relationships that we now have with these families and help them to be active participants in our community.

Albury Apex, I’m proud of you all, you punch way above your weight and you’re all class.

If you’re under forty-five and you give a damn about your local community why haven’t you joined Apex yet?