Servants Community Housing

Chairman Noel Halford’s introduction of speaker Matt Maudlin touched of Noel's long ago HR role for a factory complex in Hawthorn and how his employer had an ongoing symbiotic relationship with local boarding houses.  Otherwise unemployed and or homeless men gained meaningful employment and the employer labour.  Come forward to more recent times, these boarding houses and the labour intensive manufacturing operations ceased to exist in Hawthorn-Kew.   Yet the vulnerable and homeless still existed and continue to do so.

Matt Maudlin proud of his English background  but now Australian (with wife and children here to show for his migration) from 1989, told of how he had become involved in Servants Community Housing and confronted the problems of the homeless. 

It was sobering (to be forced to acknowledge the existence and the issues of the homeless in our well-to–do suburb) but inspiring to learn of people like Matt and Servants Community Housing seeking to help.   This non-profit entity runs two Community Houses and is looking to open a third in our suburban area.

As espoused by Matt, coupled with the basic goal to provide shelter there was the critical aspect of ensuring the preservation of “human dignity” for the residents of the community houses.  In describing some of the residents - and most are very long term ones - there was the common thread of mental illness. Still each resident had an interesting life story to tell, and Matt observed that the overt telling of that was often rewarding and beneficial to the community and the individual.

Matt hence pursued the idea of creating a book of these stories and together with Scotch College had produced the wonderful book titled “Anthology –stories of respect dignity and hope".  Far surpassing expectations the book had been very well received by all and was a wonderful introduction to Servants Community Housing and its residents.   A second publication is planned.    

Thank you Matt for a great address, it made us all reflect on the issues of the homeless elements of our society.