The Disability Trust is delighted to announce our merger with Southern Sydney Trusted Care (SSTC) on January, 1, 2012. SSTC originated as an early intervention service in 1974 and has evolved today into a quality respite and recreation service that provides care in the Sutherland shire, Hurstville, Kogarah and Rockdale local government areas.

The Hon Andrew Constance and our 2010 Roll of Honour recipient Junee Waites performed the cutting of the ribbon to officially open the new Bega “Barracks” office on Friday 3rd December.

The first Friends of The Disability Trust Christmas Party for 2011 was held at the North Wollongong Hotel on Friday 2 December 2011 and was well supported by staff. The afternoon raised over $3,000 for Sport & Recreation Services. I would like to thank all the committee members of The Friends of the Trust for their support and certainly look forward to next year’s events starting off with Bare Foot Bowls! The group have a fundraising target of $120,000 and hope to raise enough money for a bus.

Recreation Illawarrra in conjunction with Ray White Illawarra held our annual golf day on Friday 28 October 2011. The day was a great success with over 100 people attending the charity event. This year the team and the key supporters from Friends of The Trust managed to raise $25,000 for Sport and Recreation Services.

Thank you to everyone who attended our AGM on the 24th November at the City Beach Function Centre, I’m sure you would agree it was another great night. This year our guest speakers were Dr Robert Leitner, Dr Bruce Chenoweth and Jurgen Wille.

The Minister Andrew Constance also opened our new office in Shellharbour on Tuesday 20th December. It is wonderful to be able to provide so many state of the art offices for our staff.

What a fabulous production! Well done to Altogether Drama who have just finished their performances of Cinderella at the Wollongong Workshop Theatre. This was a 12 month production involving cast from The Disability Trust’s Altogether drama group and Wollongong Workshop Theatre. The shows had the audiences laughing in aisles and were exceptionally well received. Congratulations to all actors on another superb show.

On Sunday 11 December 2011 the CUA Jammers did their annual NRE Wollongong Hawks Display at the WEC. This was a great night with the participants being well received by the audience in attendance. $1613.35 was raised on the night, what a fantastic effort! Thank you to all those Jammers who helped collect money on the night. I would also like to thank Mili Simic and the team at the Hawks for their great support in enabling Sport & Rec to display their program.

Recently clients have had the opportunity to attend three camps across the organisation. Camps have included two run by our Sport and Recreation Services to Broken Bay and Berry and one run by our Moruya Day Service to Jindabyne. The camps are only possible with the additional support from the Sony Foundation, TIGS, Ecocem and Premier Illawarra Bus Services. Thank you to all the great staff who worked on the camps ensuring they were a great success.

Race for Kids was another successful event held by The Disability Trust on Saturday 19 November 2011.  Raising approximately $19,000 for Kids Fund and our Sport & Recreation programs.  The weather was great, the fashions fantastic, and some of the punters didn’t do too badly either.  See for yourself the fun that was had.