Date: 2008-07-01
Demonstrating just how in touch certain Boards are with their business, three Community Housing Limited Board directors will be travelling with Managing Director Steve Bevington to take a first hand look at the organisation’s work in Timor Leste.
This won’t be the first trip for Chairman Christopher Shields, who officially opened CHL’s first major project of seven homes in February 2007. Mr. Shields, an architect with a specialisation in affordable housing design, understands just how important building design is in relation to the surrounding environment.
“I think one of the major reasons CHL is succeeding in Timor Leste where other organisations have failed, is because we’ve taken the time to understand exactly what’s needed and practical for housing Timorese people. There are a range of factors from interviewing future tenants and sourcing local materials to issues of public health, the climate and the culture,” he says.
“We’re also investing in the community by training local workers in the various trades needed to build the homes. The Timorese government can see the investment CHL is making in the future of Timor Leste.”
The three day trip will involve observing all aspects of CHL’s operation in Timor Leste, including meeting employees, visiting project sites, meeting the locally-trained building team, and meeting with government officials.
CHL Board member Karine Shellshear was appointed to the CHL in 2007. She says operating in Timor Leste was an ideal place to start CHL’s international expansion.
“While it’s only a 90 minute flight from Australia, CHL has the opportunity to work with one of the most disadvantaged societies anywhere in the world. At the same time, the country has extraordinary potential, and CHL has a role to play in helping Timor Leste fulfil that potential” says Mrs. Shellshear. “The community housing framework we are trying to establish is incredibly challenging, and we believe it benefits the whole organisation to be at the forefront such as adventurous and proactive housing program.”
Jannine Mayhew was appointed to the CHL Board in 2002. With much of her career dedicated to public housing tenant advocacy, Mrs. Mayhew emphasises the strong correlation between safe and secure housing and an individual’s well-being including access to education and employment.
“We’ve had to look at Timor Leste with fresh eyes. The difficulty of accessing housing in Australia is about issues of supply and demand and market forces. East Timor starts from a position of having no infrastructure to enable housing initiatives of any kind, so we have to tackle this on a range of levels. The key is to address issues such as access to education and employment alongside establishing affordable and sustainable housing. This has to happen on a political level and within a society where there have been significant levels of instability.
For Steve Bevington, having driven the Timor Leste program from its inception in 2004, he is pleased that the majority of his Board can see the progress of their decision-making and look first hand at the range of issues that make establishing an housing program in Timor Leste the most ambitious plan in CHL’s history.
“We believe housing will be one of the catalysts to stabilising the country, and the more construction work we do there the more evident that will become. We’ve invested a lot of time and effort to start the program, and now the next phase is to build the scale of our operations,” he says.