MESSAGE FROM SICMAA’S PRESIDENT

 

By: Ms Be Ha, J.P, President

 

 

 

On behalf of the Committee of Management of the Springvale Indo-Chinese Mutual Assistance Association, I am pleased to present the Association’s 1999-2000 Annual Report.

 

This year, we celebrate the 18th years of SICMAA’s services to the Indo-Chinese people in South-Eastern region of Melbourne and to the general community as a whole. It has been a 18 years of continuous progress and renewal which we can all look back with great pride at the volume of work and range of services that the Association has achieved so far.

 

The past twelve months have seen a remarkable growth in terms of specialised services for the young Indo-Chinese and their families. For us this is not something we are proud of but concern, because it shows that our youths are in deeper trouble. There are three main programs that are now available for young offenders and drug related issues. They are the Indo-Chinese Young Offenders Pilot Program (YOPP), the National Illicit Drugs Prevention Program (NIDPP) and the Correctional Counselling Program (CCP). Two of these programs are new whereas the YOPP is an existing service that has got its further extension for another 6 months until June 2001.

 

Without going into great detail on specific projects or programs which I trust you can view via reports from individual staff members, I would like to mention a few significant achievements our Association has achieved so far in 1999-2000:

 

In organisation terms, SICMAA has involved more with tendering process; carried out an up-to-date SWOT analysis on the organisation; increased volunteerism; sought funding from alternative sources such as philanthropic trusts; dealt and negotiated with corporate business sector more for program or project support, engaged with the media more in particular the local media to put forward the views of the Indochinese community and promoting positive contributions and images of the same to the wider community; engaged and interacted more ultimately with government processes such as senate and parliamentary inquiries (i.e: gambling and drug inquires); played a stronger and direct role in training of mainstream NGO and government services staff in S-E region, modernised and upgraded our equipment such as computers, internet access, photocopiers etc…

 

In employment and training, SICMAA has lost two of its valuable employees from the employment service: Danielle Le and Diana Tan but was able to recruit two new young and capable workers namely Philip Tu and Kim Nguyen. With hardwork and ethusiasm, Kim and Philip have not only wiped out the placement deficits at the time of their selection but successfully achieved ahead of their monthly targets to date.

 

In social services, SICMAA has initiated and worked with all levels of governments and mainstream service providers to deal with some of the most urgent problems in the Indo-Chinese communities such as drugs, family breakdown, gambling and the high incarceration rates of Indo-Chinese offenders. Culturally, our organisation has tiredlessly promoted further understanding and closely shared Indo-Chinese culture with the whole community by turning the original Vietnamese Children’s Festival into a festival for every child in the City of Greater Dandenong.

 

In caring for the environment, SICMAA has involved in a number of significant environment and fishery projects with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources and the Vietnamese Community in Victoria to address the educational issues on illegal fishing and catching of prohibited marine shellfish.

Of course these are only a few illustrated projects or programs that reflect specific efforts of SICMAA to better assist the Indo-Chinese people in the S-E region. They are by no means more important or significant than other regular and on-going services that SICMAA provides.

 

On behalf of the Committee of Management, I would like to thank all the special people who have contributed their valuable time, effort, assistance, support, advice and most important of all, their long lasting friendship. With your on-going support, I am confident that we can make the future of our Association in the new millenium even more successful.

 

I would like to take this opportunity to give special thanks to: