Waimea Weekly
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Your Community Newspaper
Wednesday 30 January 2013
Forgotten treasures
Standing the Test of Time
Page 13
Page 18 - 20
Sarau gets go ahead
Page 24
‘We’re so sick of it’
Kindergarten vandalism ongoing
Phillip Rollo
Sarau Festival organiser Jenny Leith prepares some blackcurrants for this weekend’s event outside the Moutere Hills Community Centre. Photo: Phillip Rollo. A devastating fire at the Moutere Hills Community Centre will not stop this weekend’s Sarau Festival – an event first created to celebrate that exact facility. The blackcurrant-themed festival will still be held outside the
Thrilling finale
community centre and thanks to the generous support of some key sponsors; marquees, electricity and portable toilets will be brought in to make up for the fire damage. Speaking just days between the
fire and the event, organiser Jenny Leith says the fair’s point of difference is its blackcurrant theme, which ties in well with the region known for its blackcurrant SEE PAGE 2
Staff at a Richmond kindergarten are fed up with finding used condoms, drug utensils and damaged property when they arrive at work, saying they are reporting some sort of vandalism at least once a month. Henley Kindergarten staff contacted Waimea Weekly late last year after six months of vandalism saw someone set fire to the sandpit, spray graffiti all over the playground and break equipment. Since they made contact, the damage has been ongoing and teacher Sue Hone says they are over it. “It’s got the point where we come to work expecting to find broken bottles,” she says. “When they start damaging property and making it a dangerous place for children then it’s a problem. We’ve had graffiti and broken pot plants since we last spoke. It’s not on.” Because of rising insurance costs after a spate of school fires, the money to replace broken equipment has had to
come out of the fund previously used to pay for the children’s programme. “To replace a table was about $250 and that’s the same as the excess. The kids lose because we can’t buy new puzzles or books because we have to pay for this sort of stuff, or it never gets replaced. This is a place for small children, it’s not okay.” Teacher Denise Martin says the worst incident was a fire in the sandpit. “They could have burned the whole place down. But finding broken bottles all over the playground is pretty bad too because our children run out with bare feet. But no vandalism is ever okay, is it?” The kindergarten has had to up its security as a result of the vandalism but Nelson Police says “this is not a new issue” and that similar incidents are being reported right across the district particularly during the school holidays. “It is not just the kindergarten being targeted, although the kindergarten SEE PAGE 2
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