THE fact that clients such as Gary Bock have such a high opinion of St George Community Housing has greatly contributed to the award the organisation has just received.
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Community Sector Banking, which lends money to not-for-profit-organisations, has chosen SGCH as one of two recipients of its inaugural Housing Impact awards.
Its head of funding and projects, Joe Sheehan, said the award was in recognition of the excellent work done by the SGCH sustainable tenancy team.
"Their sustainable tenancy team is good at detecting when people are experiencing hardship and they have innovative ways to reduce tenants' stress," Mr Sheehan said.
Gary Bock is one of those grateful people whose life has changed for the better after being taken under the SGCH wing.
Mr Bock, 52, has enjoyed five trouble-free years at his Hurstville unit and has no plans to move.
"My rent is paid automatically and as long as I behave myself I can stay here for the rest of my life," he said.
"But 15 years ago I was sleeping on the street by Central Station."
Mr Bock has a long story of ill health and ill luck.
After his stints at sleeping rough at Central Station — "because my girlfriend at the time kept kicking me out" — he got a job on a rubbish truck and went to live in a hotel in the St George region.
He said his room flooded after rain and was so cockroach-infested he used to wake up covered in insects.
His liaison officer at a Rockdale mental health service heard about it and put him in touch with SGCH.
‘‘Within a week I was in a one-bedroom unit at Rockdale,’’ Mr Bock said.
He would have continued to stay there but for a stroke 11 years ago which left him partially paralysed and unable to negotiate the stairs.
As SGCH had no suitable accommodation at the time, it rented a place for Mr Bock on the private market.
But this offered no stability as leases were sometimes not continued.
‘‘I had gone through my second move when they told me about this unit,’’ Mr Bock said.
‘‘I jumped on my mobility scooter and came straight away — these units were still being built.’’
His mum, Lyn Bock, a regular visitor, also couldn’t be happier that her son is so settled.
The other inaugural Community Sector Banking Housing Impact Award was given to the Victorian-based Haven: Home, Safe for its pioneering work helping low income earners move into permanent housing.
- The Hurstville-based SGCH started 30 years ago and now operates across 24 local government areas of Sydney and provides housing for more than 8000 people in 4300 homes.
It is focused on providing quality social and affordable housing.
Any income the organisation receives is re-invested in the business to increase the supply of quality affordable homes.
- Community Sector Banking formed as a 50/50 joint venture between shareholders Bendigo Bank and the Community 21 consortium of not-for-profit organisations including Oxfam, Scope, Jobs Australia, ACOSS, OzChild and Able Australia.