Grampians Disability Advocacy has received $118,000 to help grow membership and communication strategies.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The Grampians group were one of 127 disability organisations awarded a federal government Information, Linkages and Capacity Building (ILC) grant under the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
Advocacy executive officer Deborah Verdon said part of the emphasis of NDIS was to build the capacity within communities to include people with disability.
"We have over 200 members with either a disability or people who are involved in the disability sector," she said.
"We applied for one of the grants. There were two parts to the conditions of receiving the grant.
"One part was to build the capacity of the resources within the Grampians Disability Advocacy as an organisation
"This will include looking into our board structure, providing training for the board, a review of our membership and working out the ways we can more effectively communicate with our members."
Mrs Verdon said the second part of the conditions involved setting up peer support groups across the region.
"This is to increase the capacity for people with a disability to contribute and engage within their community," she said.
"It's also an avenue for people to come together and discuss and problem solve any issues that are occurring in their lives.
"We have one year to do all of that - so we've employed a project officer to run all of the new programs."
Carol Starkey has recently joined the Advocacy organisation.
"Another part of the grant which is important to us is an updated website and social media policy," Mrs Verdon said.
"We want to update our website to be more interactive with our membership base.
"We have a lot of things as an organisation we have wanted to do but haven't had the resources to do it."
Mrs Verdon said despite being called "Grampians" disability advocacy, the organisation covers a wide region within western Victoria.
"There's a historical reason for the name which was chosen when we started more than 20 years ago," she said.
"Even though we are known as "Grampians" based on the health care areas - we cover the region from Ballarat right through to the South Australian border."
While you're with us, you can now receive updates straight to your inbox each Friday morning from the Stawell Times-News. To make sure you're up-to-date with all the news from across the Northern Grampians shire, sign up here.