Empowering communities

It's a world away from dairy science and agri-recruitment, but just a day off her three-year anniversary as RAPID co-ordinator in Athlone, surrounded by masses of paperwork, Anne Galvin reflects and jokes that they have a cake for her every year! A native of Ferbane in Offaly, where she still leaves, Anne is well versed on all things in the Lake County having previously worked for six years in Westmeath Community Development and Leader before taking over the reins of RAPID coordinator from her predecessor Tina Tully, who had run the project from its inception in 2002 right up to 2007. RAPID, which stands for Revitalising Areas through Planning, Investment and Development was developed during the Celtic Tiger years to target areas that were missing out on some of the benefits of affluence after an analysis of the 2006 census. A lack of facilities for youth, older people, education and problems like high unemployment, drug addiction and anti-social behaviour were identified by the Department of Rural, Social and Gaeltacht Affairs as areas to prioritise and work to improve on. There are currently 51 RAPID areas in the country. In Athlone, six estates are designated with the status, those being Battery Heights, Blackberry Lane, Ashdale Woodlands Grove, Sarsfield Square, Monksland, St Mel's Terrace and more recently, Willow Park/ Meadowbrook was added to the list along with the town of Mullingar, an area Anne will also work on due to budgetary cutbacks. A clear pragmatist, Anne, who is based in the Civic Centre, says some see the RAPID designation as a bad thing but she urges the public to look at what can be achieved. "It's a brand some see negatively but I would say look at it positively because it means you are put to the top. You are being given priority because it is seen you need that," she enthuses. "The way I put it is you are in a RAPID area and because of that you are you are hoping to get the best of attention, services and funding to make it a better place to live." The RAPID programme doesn't actually come with its own fund but what Anne tries to source monies from elsewhere, the Dormant Accounts Fund, HSE, Department of the Environment, the Dormant Accounts Fund and anyone that has money, she laughs with her typical good humour. "The major issues in the RAPID estates are high unemployment, anti-social behaviour, drug trafficking, misuse of substances like alcohol or drugs, especially among young people. We try and work with the groups to leverage funding to put in place programmes and activities which will help," highlighting the AIRE support group for families who have experience of drug addiction as one of the initiative last year. "Also in the past, we would have put in playgrounds, the latest one was in Ashdale. Willow Park and Meadowbrook need a playground and they don't have one and that's one of the projects we would hope to fund in the future. Other things we have done is estate enhancement and traffic calming, you see examples of that in Woodlands and Ashdale, where there is a pedestrian crossing linking the two estates," she states, two projects the council may not have had the funds to do but can help sustain once they are in place. "In Battery Heights, we got money from Department of Justice for graffiti removal, if you go up there now it looks so much better the wall alongside the railway was always covered in graffiti, we removed all that. The water tower around that area is relatively clean and in fact, what it shows while another bit of graffiti came back on it in December 2008, the residents themselves went out and painted over it." The beauty of RAPID is that the residents drive ideas for improving their own areas, feeding into agencies via their own community group to a residents forum and a RAPID team, which brings together all the statutory agencies, HSE, gardai, FAS and Regional Youth Services, VEC, local authority various bodies who have the funding and manpower to make the take the ideas and put them into practice or give them legs as Anne jokes. "My job is to ensure is that those issues are heard and that we get some sort of response from the people who can make the difference, who have the power to do something. Whether it be anti-social behaviour in their estate, or attention needed to their houses, there is drug trafficking going on or noise, various things that affect people's living," Anne says, highlighting a recent success has been the start of a Halloween' Festival which will run over two days this year, something that came directly from residents who wanted something to stop anti-social behaviour at bonfires on October 31, and instead provide a safe event for young people to enjoy. "We've also had the Dormant Accounts and this is where the communities themselves applied for funding. Say, in Monksland Community Centre, they had a storage room and now they've turned that into a meeting room. That was all done with €10,000 funding from Dormant Accounts. Unfortunately, that has dried up and we haven't received anything in the last twelve months but we are hoping we will next year or the year after." Instead, the RAPID scheme has been forced to tap into other sources of funding such as the Development of Young Peoples Facilities fund, which has resulted in some €80,000 for the Gateway Project for the development of a new youth cafe in Athlone, a facility that will also benefit RAPID areas. "There is no two days the same and now it will be very different with Mullingar and Athlone. It is a challenge but I'm always up for a challenge," said Anne, who attributes her current career choice to a community-oriented family who are involved in voluntary organisations like the ICA, Comhaltas and Gorta in Ferbane. "I'm a person who can't me sat at a desk for even five hours a day, I have to be up and out and about. I love meeting people. Every person is so different and just the time you think you have someone figured out they surprise you. I suppose the buzz I get is the enthusiasm of people." She is full of praise for the role of volunteers. "You don't realise what volunteers are doing in your community until you do a bit for yourself, like organising a fun day and other events like summer camps," she pointed out. "I would hope and love to see that day as the estates would be so much better improved because of RAPID and wouldn't need it anymore... but the RAPID estates weren't created in five years, they are there a long time and a lot of issues are there a long time. It's a bit rich to say a five year or ten year programme will solve it but certainly it might help the next generation to look at it differently, that's what you would hope," she concludes but stresses for this to happen there has to be a team effort on the part of everyone involved.