Community Partners Program
OzPol has received funding to establish a Community Partners Program (CPP). This program allows OzPol to form partnerships between culturally and Linguistically Diverse Communities (CALD) and service providers to maximise the benefits of specialist expertise available through both CPP and Partners in Culturally Appropriate Care (PICAC) program, to meet cultural needs of older people from these communities.
OzPol proposes to address the needs of Eastern European aged community members from the EE communities. Polish, Croatian, Czech, Russian, Slovak and Ukrainian living in the Brisbane North, South and Gold Coast Region.
As some of the Eastern European (EE) communities are small and have no infrastructure in place to provide the necessary support to their elderly, the CPP program will be most advantageous to these communities .OzPol will seek to address current and real needs of the EE aged community members.
Some of these communities have the highest proportion of aged migrants in Australia, who have not developed community support structures and their elderly members have limited access to culturally specific services.
Supported information and referral services will also be provided to members of the targeted EE communities as well as EE community organizations. Co-operative links will be built to ensure that targeted EE community members have an awareness off and access to mainstream support.
An education and training component will also be an integral part of this program. We will endeavour to utilize resources and information brochures that have been in use by various cultural diverse organizations throughout Australia. The brochures provided to the EE community members will be in their specific language. We will be working in conjunction with cultural appropriate organizations throughout Australia.
The CPP Project Plan will provide and encourage access to aged care services and respite as follows:
Initiate and conduct 6 information sessions to the Polish, Croatian, Czech, Russian, Slovakian and Ukrainian EE communities. These sessions will consist of 3 information sessions and 3 radio broadcasts on alternate months and continue for 3 years.
The radio sessions will commence on 4EB Ethnic Radio October, December etc. and the information sessions November, January etc.
There will be on going education sessions for 3 years regarding the Aged Care System, eligibility criteria, access, care recipient, rights and responsibilities and how to choose an appropriate facility or community services.
Individual telephone and face to face information and referral services will also be ongoing.
Promotion of CPP services to target EE communities in partnership with the relevant community partners in the target region.
As required there will be yearly bus tours with volunteer drivers to facilitate for interested individuals and their families.
Support and information will be available as required to mainstream Aged and Community Care Service providers in the Brisbane North, South and Gold Coast region to enhance service outcomes for the target community in the same manner as discussed above.
Referrals will be provided to other appropriate services when the need arises.