June 30, 2015
Haircuts and hangi for rough sleepers
Auckland's rough sleepers can take a break from the street this Thursday and Friday at Te Puni Kokiri's Matariki Homeless Wananga at Tatai Hono Marae in Epsom.
Tamaki regional manager Marty Rogers says it will be a chance to get a kai and a haircut, get their health checked, and much more.
She says 80 percent of those sleeping on the streets of central Auckland are Maori, and there are hundreds more sleeping in cars or living in unsafe or unsuitable accommodation.
She says homelessness is not a choice but a devastating reality that deserves a compassionate response.
"We pass them when we go into the city. We walk past them. Sometimes we look away. Sometimes we look towards them. So I hope this opportunity Matariki brings us a way of us as individiauls to say 'you're whanau, we care, it's not much but it's a start,'" she says.
Marty Rogers is keep for other whanau to pick up the idea so there can be a monthly homeless wananga, and she is also taking part in Thursday night's Lifewise Big Sleepout to raise awareness of homelessness.
Copyright © 2015, UMA Broadcasting Ltd: www.waateanews.com