Kerry Steller is one of our busy members in Armidale.

Despite the area’s pastoral wealth and the presence of a major university, the City of Armidale has considerable social disadvantage. Kerry Steller moved here in 1981, teaching at O’Connor Catholic College and got involved with the St Vincent de Paul Society, which left her with strong memories.

They include former residents of Freeman House, the Society’s Special Works service providing residential and community-based programs for adults experiencing drug and alcohol addiction along with men’s homelessness.

“I remember some of these folk working through their issues and later returning to join our St Augustine’s Conference where they could reach out to other people in need,” Kerry recalls.

“Coming back to join was amazing.”

Another standout was meeting a Taiwanese nursing student who was studying at the University of New England.

“She boarded with us for a while and came along to our English literacy classes at the Ozanam Learning Centre. Most of the attendees were from the refugee Azidi community from Iraq.

“This girl knew nothing about Vinnies or even Christianity, but when she saw the work we were doing, she joined up and helped us out. It was wonderful to see how the experience affected her.”

Kerry Steller is the President of the Armidale Regional Council, and secretary of St Augustine’s Conference, closely linked to Freeman House, founded by local Vincentian Don Hewitt, who was honoured by the Vatican and this year received an OAM award.

She was raised on the land near Canowindra, schooled in Sydney, completed a Bachelor of Science degree (geology and geophysics) at The University of Sydney, and a DipEd at UNE after moving to Armidale.

Now retired, Kerry retains close links with O’Connor Catholic College where many students are Vinnies supporters and fundraisers. She has arranged visitations to nursing homes and many excursions to Sydney where students visited St Canice’s Church close to Kings Cross which assists many people experiencing homelessness.

Activities for Freeman House residents include weekly coffee and cake afternoons, cooking, music, bowling, childcare, and bushwalks where staff and Conference members join companions, male and female, aged from their 20s to 60s.

The ‘Fresh Start’ program, a recipient of community sleepout funds, focuses on personal welfare such as dental and eye health, community involvement with varied outings, and arranging furniture storage for people who had to vacate accommodation.

“These practical measures have tangible outcomes,” Kerry says, “including a role in helping reunite people with family members they thought they’d lost forever.”

Another innovation is a ‘family conference’ pilot that sees parents and their children visiting an individual or family once a month to discuss their needs and concerns. Each family has access to a mentor who can assist with the practicalities such as food, if need be.

At the other end of the age spectrum the local conferences are working on ways of bringing back older Vincentians who moved away from Society work because of the COVID-19 requirements.

Kerry Steller works with the parish and the Catholic Schools office, is a member of Zonta and has a long commitment to the Armidale Tree Group that regenerates bushfire-affected land and helps to restores koala habitat. Then there are her three grandchildren and of course seven SVDP conferences.

Her phone’s ringing constantly…

“I’d better go,” Kerry says, and who would dare stand in her way?

With the winding back of measures to control the spread of COVID-19, St Vincent de Paul Society members have been returning to more face-to-face support.

The most high-profile activity our members have been involved in during the last financial year has been providing assistance in the wake of the Northern Rivers floods. They did this both in the immediate aftermath and on an ongoing basis.

The St Vincent de Paul Society NSW was the first major charity to provide emergency cash grants to people in need. Our members were there on the ground distributing this money to people who, often, had only the clothes on their backs.

The distribution centres were set up quickly, ran efficiently, and were well-targeted due to the Society being able to build on experience from previous natural disasters. Similarly, this experience was used to help make the process member-driven.

As this is being written, months later, people in Lismore and other worst-hit areas are still unable to move back into their homes. To that end, the Society has been and will continue to provide ongoing support to the people of the Northern Rivers.

Our members in the north of the state, too, have been involved in the ongoing rebuilding and resilience building projects led by our Bushfire Community Recovery and Community Development team.

Elsewhere in the state, our members have been no less busy helping their communities.

From community cooking events to provide meals, to packing and distributing fresh fruit and vegetables, to operating literacy and numeracy programs, to increased engagement with First Nations Elders, the Society’s members are finding ways new and old to engage with their communities.

The Society’s new record-keeping system, the Conference Assistance Management System (CAMS) has also continued its rollout, with larger conferences helping smaller ones with the process. CAMS is aimed at helping members provide better support to the people we assist.

Our members contributed 31,085 hours of service to support 70,086 people during the 2021/22 financial year. They provided $7,780,171 worth of food, electricity, clothing, furniture, accommodation, transport, medical costs and more. Among those assisted were 8,090 people living with a disability and 8,088 people identifying as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander.

The main form of assistance requested of our members this year, as with previous years, was food. 84% of people seeking assistance reported not having enough food to get by. Many of them had dependent children whose health and development could be impacted by inadequate nutrition.

Around 70% of people supported by our conferences are living at or below the poverty line, with one in 20 getting by on $500 or less per fortnight. Many are unemployed or underemployed, with more than half receiving government income support as their primary source of income. 55% are experiencing housing stress, spending more than 30% of their income on accommodation.

Find out more below about the circumstances and demographics of people assisted by our members.

Throughout NSW there are almost 4,500 youth members engaged in schools and communities. 

Our largest cohort are our primary school-based Mini Vinnies, with more than 3,846 students who take part in fundraising appeals and school sleepouts, and take action on social justice issues that affect their local communities. 

Our 448 high school members work together to do the same and more, working on community gardening programs, Vinnies Vans and organising their own social justice events. 

We have around 200 young adult members in university, parish and community-based conferences. Young adult members run social days for kids and teens, homework programs, volunteer on Vinnies Vans and run social justice advocacy and fundraising initiatives. 

Marissa Papaspiros is a Vinnies member and a representative of our Sydney Youth.

This year’s theme for National Student Volunteer Week is “Passion. Opportunity. Change.” and these are some of the driving forces for Marissa Papaspiros, a Society member.

“I joined Vinnies because I just saw a lot of need and I wanted to do something about it in any capacity.

“I had done a lot of volunteering in high school and I just was looking for something like that that I could do outside of school and Vinnies provided that opportunity to fuel that passion,” she says.

“I have developed such good problem-solving skills and flexibility and communication and the ability just to be able to talk with so many different people and appreciate different perspectives.

“And I’m really, really grateful for that opportunity because it just transcends and translates into all different aspects of my life,” Marissa says.

Marissa says she really values the way members do things, “That value of constantly learning and reflecting and working with people and supporting people and collaborating to enact change.

“And I think that’s the really important part with Vinnies.

“When I started, sometimes I would come home in tears from Brekky Vans and Night Patrols and my Dad said to me, ‘You’ve got to stop.’

“He said to me, ‘What you’re doing is important in that moment. You’ve had a chat with that person. You’ve provided them something to eat, something to drink and that’s all you could do in that moment,’” she says.

Marissa says she views the work she does through the lens provided by St Mary MacKillop when she said: “Do all you can with the means at your disposal, and calmly leave the rest to God.”

Marissa has many stories to tell about these small moments of connection with the people she’s assisted, one involving impromptu karaoke.

“She used to talk about how she loved Bon Jovi, so I would get it up on my phone and we’d have a singing contest.

“I would sing, absolutely horribly and horrendously – I would just belt it out – and she was so happy and we used to do that every time I went out.

“I think that used to help – I hope that helped – because she loved singing Livin’ on a Prayer.

“It was the most beautiful thing, we used to have great laugh,” she says.

When asked what it is she most values about volunteering with the Society, Marissa says, without hesitation, that it’s the people – and by association what they’ve taught her.

“I remember going on a Night Patrol and there was this beautiful lady that I did it with.

“She was just so gorgeous and she said to the person that we were serving, ‘How do you like your coffee?’

“And I thought that’s a really nice way of asking that.

“It’s more respectful, it’s more reminiscent of a café, it’s just nicer.”

“Also, the people that we serve because you just learn so much about people and you connect.

“I just feel at peace when I’m volunteering,” she says.