Quiz a chance for organisations to bolster working relationships while supporting Albany Community Foundation

Community groups, organisations and agencies focused on providing relief for those facing adversity in Albany came together for a quiz night last week to raise money for the Albany Community Foundation.

More than 70 representatives from the ACF, Advance Housing, Albany Youth Support Association, Pivot Support Services, the Housing Authority, the City of Albany and Anglicare attended the event.

Advance Housing hosted the night and raised $1110 for the ACF. ACF chair Tae Wood said would go directly to its crisis response fund. “All agencies get equal access to that fund to support people that are suffering severe housing stress in our community,” he said.

“That’s obviously a really topical issue at the moment within our community and right across Australia with the cost-of-living crisis we’re seeing. So it’s really timely to do some additional fundraising to prop up the funds in our crisis response accounts.”

Mr Wood said the quiz night was a “really unique” event within the sector. “I work across the community foundation sector all over Australia and I’ve never seen it before where community organisations will initiate fundraising off their own back in support of a community foundation,” he said.

“It was a really unique experience for the sector and a privilege for us here in Albany.”

Advance Housing chief executive John Lysaught said it was pleasing to see the room packed for the event.

He said he believed bringing members of the community sector together in a social setting would further improve the already strong working relationships between the Albany groups.

“The staff from these service providers deal with each other in the midst of supporting people, so they can be dealing with some pretty horrific things,” he said.

“To create an environment where they actually got to interact socially was a real positive, for it to come together and be done in such way that it raised funds for a genuine local asset like ACF was a win-win for everybody.

“We’ve always talked about what a strong relationship service providers have in this area, this is just another example of how well that work.”

Mr Lysaught said ACF had always been a great support to Advance Housing as well as other Albany-based organisations.

“Particularly over COVID they worked very, very closely with most of the service agencies going above and beyond,” he said.

“They are a fantastic organisation and a really good example of how it can be done well at a local level with virtually no overhead through the will of local business people.”

Mr Wood said feedback from those attending the night was positive and he would like the quiz to become a regular event.

“We can see this as a permanent annual fixture on the calendar, it would be something to look forward to and something we can grow into to improve each year,” he said.