Activities & Achievements in 2009/2010
Suicide Prevention ** ICCWA Wins National Award**
The Resilience Project: ICCWA continues to manage the Resilience Project in the rural south west region of WA, and was awarded the Suicide Prevention Australia LIFE Award for Healthy Communities in 2009. This multi-level suicide prevention project centres on building community resilience, reducing risk factors for suicide and addressing service gaps. Along with the ‘A Way Through’ Project, over 1400 community members benefited from 120 skill building workshops held across the south west region.
Indigenous Health & Safety
Healing through the Map: ICCWA has received funding from the Australian Government, Department of Health and Ageing to deliver this project to regional WA. “The Map” workshops are facilitated by Wisdom in Your Life and provide a set of practical tools for health professionals to engage the communities they serve on mental health issues whilst improving their capability for self care. It also offers practical information and skills for country members. The Map workshops are a key component of ICCWA’s resilience building and suicide prevention programs.
Youth Projects **NEW**
Y-Safety? A question and answer forum with young people'. Y-Safety? is a facilitated forum event that provides injury prevention and community safety promotion professionals, from the Bunbury region, with an opportunity to directly ask questions and engage with young people from the City of Bunbury about their priority community safety issues and concerns. The project is funded through the Department for Communities, Healthway and The Drug & Alcohol Office, with additional in kind support from organisations in the Bunbury Region.
Our Space, Safe Place (OSSP) is a social perceptions project that aims to engage young people to help raise awareness around the importance of safety in public places and perceived safety of public spaces in the community that are important to young people. The project will use art, photography and prose, created by young people from a range of backgrounds to communicate young people’s perceptions of safety. Project findings will inform both government and non-government agencies as well as community groups who work across community safety related sectors to inform future policy and program development, advocacy and service delivery.The project is currently supported by Lotterywest and the Department for Communities’ Office for Youth.
Falls Prevention
A comprehensive range of awareness raising activities in the area of falls prevention in older people – particularly awareness raising and promotion of the Stay on Your Feet WA® (SOYFWA®) program. ICCWA has been a key service provider for the Department of Health WA’s, Stay On Your Feet WA® program since 2001. ICCWA coordinates activities such as resource development and dissemination, professional development and training, awareness raising activities such as community presentations, displays and events, Stay On Your Feet WA® Week, media, marketing and communications, training and information for Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Communities, referral to appropriate services and coordination of a volunteer program.
The Stay On Your Feet WA® Falls Prevention Resources Information Centre has also been established by ICCWA with funding from the Department of Health WA. The Resources Information Centre forms part of the State Falls Prevention Network and provides a single point of access for information and tools on falls prevention. Resources have been developed for people who are considered to be at a greater risk of falling, such as the ‘up from the floor’ resource. Other resources for Health Professionals have also been produced to raise awareness of the risk of falling to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Our Stay On Your Feet WA® volunteer peer educators have been kept busy fulfilling the many requests by community groups for our free falls prevention presentations. Over the last 12 months peer educators delivered more than 95 presentations to over 3000 seniors across the metropolitan area.
Alcohol Projects
Safer Bars WA is a training program funded under the Criminal Property Confiscation Act through the WA Attorney General’s Department. The program provides skills to develop the ability of staff members at licensed premises to appropriately identify, effectively handle and ultimately reduce aggression and violence in and around venues that serve alcohol. Several venues in the Town of Vincent are participating in the pilot project. ICCWA has worked closely with WA Police, the Drug and Alcohol Office, Racing, Gaming & Liquor and other key stakeholders to adapt the training to the WA context.
The Drink or Drunk Study examines why staff at licensed premises continue to serve patrons to intoxication despite current laws and interventions such as the compulsory Responsible Service of Alcohol training. The objectives of the study are to better understand why staff continue to serve patrons to intoxication, examine factors that increase the probability of staff serving patrons to intoxication and identify barriers staff face at licensed premises to provide responsible service. The study is funded by the National Drug Law Enforcement Research Fund.
The Alcohol Think Again education campaign is a partnership project between ICCWA and the Drug and Alcohol Office which aims to reduce risky alcohol use by changing the acceptability of drunkenness, discouraging drunken behaviour and creating safer drinking environments.
WACAN
The WA Community Alcohol Network (WACAN) is an informal, State-wide inter-sectoral network of Government, non-Government, community organisations and individuals with an interest in reducing the problems associated with drunkenness. WACAN aims to reduce and foster public awareness of the problems associated with drunkenness by challenging alcohol related social rituals and Western Australia’s drinking culture in general.
Professional Development & Capacity Building
ICCWA, with the support of the Department of Health WA, is delivering a range of professional development services to health professionals working in rural and remote WA. The project aims to build the capacity of health professionals and community groups to deliver health promotion messages to the community and to raise awareness of community safety and injury prevention issues. Initiatives include forums, conferences, video conference seminars, regional networking and information sharing sessions. The next in a series of community safety and injury prevention forums is planned for Broome in 2010.
Community Safety Month
The aim of Community Safety Month is to engage the community and encourage participation to improve safety in the community. This year ICCWA was the coordinating organisation with a new reference group to support and provide input for initiatives, resources and all events planned in 2009. Over 100 community safety events and activities took place throughout October. ICCWA hosted the launch – a Breakfast of Champions on October 1 2009 which included close to 100 guests and celebrated stories of communities and individuals championing safety.
Safe Communities
Representation on the Management Committee of the Australian Safe Communities Foundation and building national and international contacts with specialists in the development of Safe Communities using the World Health Organisation and Canadian models. ICCWA’s Safe Communities portfolio has been re-established as ICCWA continues to promote the Safe Communities philosophies for safety promotion at the local level and support communities in their injury prevention and safety promotion initiatives. The Safe Communities portfolio also incorporates several new project areas such as Community Safety Net and Community Safety Month. ICCWA was contracted by the Australian Safe Communities Foundation to redevelop four key resources to support Safe Communities across Australia – this was completed in January 2010.
Mall Walking
Conducting highly successful walking programs for physically inactive and/or socially isolated older people in the Cities of Melville, Armadale, Belmont and Stirling. Two new groups commenced in the 2009-2010 year - Bull Creek and Spearwood.
Other Key Activities
Advocating on a range of injury issues through involvement with the Department of Health WA, Health Networks – the Injury and Trauma Working Group, the Falls Executive Committee, Injury and Trauma Executive Committee & Education Committee.
Conducting and participating in public forums on emerging injury issues. ICCWA also broadcasts selected injury prevention forums state-wide through the Westlink satellite network and through video-conferencing.
The ICCWA Newsletter which highlights injury prevention issues on a State-wide level and is distributed quarterly to approximately 5,000 individuals and organisations across WA.
The annual ICCWA Injury Prevention Awards, established in 2002, are presented in recognition of the valuable contributions of individuals and organisations to the prevention of injury in WA.
Monthly lunchtime Injury Prevention Forums to raise awareness of injury issues and provide opportunities for organisations to share information and network.