Neighbourhood connection in Queens Park

From a simple Facebook group amid the first COVID-19 shutdown, to a thriving community in Queens Park, Bruce’s community connecting is already paying dividends.

Bruce said he knew people were stressed and scared in the first half of 2020, and he was too. At the suggestion of a neighbourhood liaison officer at the City of Canning Bruce started a Facebook group, dropping a flyer in letterboxes of his residential complex to let people know about it.

Over the following months he held a couple of morning teas, which attracted a small handful of people. But when he decided to host a Driveway Do, he asked his Facebook group for help. Vanessa came forward, and suggested that they go door to door to invite people to the barbecue. He said it was the combination of flyers and that personal invitation that led to the event’s success.

‘We went door knocking, and that’s what made the difference. We knocked on people’s doors and said ‘would you like to come along?’

It might have been intimidating going door to door, but they had support from each other, and were able to draw upon Vanessa’s Chinese language skills. As a result of their joint effort, 35 people attended the barbecue on January 10, of all ages, language groups and nationalities.

‘Everyone helped pack up afterwards, which was a relief, and all my things were returned to me, it was amazing,’ Bruce said.

Bruce said he believed people connected across the diversity represented at the event, and that they would continue to nurture those connections.

‘The kids were calling me Bruce, it was really nice,’ he said.

One of the attendees even volunteered to organise the next event.

‘I learnt how keen people are for this. Some people said they had lived here for five years or so, and no-one had done anything like this,’ he said.