Community Connect
Leading the Way in Rural Networking
Introduction
Welcome to Issue 4 of Community Connected - much has happened since the last edition in May 2003, so this edition will serve to update members on recent developments.
Current Key Stakeholders
Since the last newsletter, a number of key stakeholders have joined Community Connect. Current stakeholders are:
- Department of Education and Children's Services (DECS) Yorke Region
- District Council of Barunga West
- District Council of the Copper Coast
- District Council of Yorke Peninsula
- NYP Community Health
- Kadina Business Consultancy (project facilitation, database, software and site design)
- Yorke Peninsula Division of General Practice Inc.
- Yorke Peninsula Employment
- Yorke Regional Development Board (business directory)
Software - Current Status
Members will notice the Community Connect interface has been re-vamped with a new home page and other links established - your feedback on this change would be appreciated.
A mechanism has been established to enable data registrations and feedback to occur online.
Free text searching has been completed - this brings the directory in line with the mechanisms of other search engines such as Google.
A statistics mechanism is being established to enable the number of hits to certain areas of the directory to be recorded. This data will be tabled at all future Committee meetings.
A generic letter is being established to send out with individual data to enable records that require update to be handled by efficiently each Best Qualified Organisation.
Individual user names and passwords have been generated to allow Best Qualified Organisations to effectively manage their data. Levels of access have also been established in line with security guidelines.
Data
There are currently over 1800 separate data entries on the database with more registrations gradually coming through.
As the Human Service Finder from the Department of Human Services is only being released next Month (April), work on linkages with Community Connect will not be happening until afterwards.
The data entry project officers working through DECS have completed corrections and modifications of information transferred to Community Connect from previous existing directories enabling data handover to Best Qualified Organisations to begin.
Business Information
You will notice that the Yorke Regional Development Board has joined the list of key stakeholders and is managing all business information within its boundaries, namely the District Council of Yorke Peninsula, District Council of Barunga West, Wakefield Regional Council and the District Council of Mallala.
The District Council of the Copper Coast has recently been invited by the Community Connect Executive to manage business information for its region. Members will be updated on the outcome of this proposal.
Councils within the Yorke Regional Development Board may contact Andy Wibrow on 8832 2600 for further information on the management of their business data for Community Connect.
Training
Data entry and management is currently being handed over to identified Best Qualified Organisations. The following organisations are taking responsibility for particular information applicable to their service:
- Department of Education and Children's Services - school and youth information
- Yorke Peninsula Division of General Practice - exercise and health
- Yorke Regional Development Board - business
- District Council of Yorke Peninsula - all other community information within the region
- District Council of Barunga West - all other community information within the region
- District Council of the Copper Coast - all other community information within the region
Next Meeting Date
A full Community Connect Committee meeting will be held on Tuesday 1st June at the Yorke District Education Office, 13 Taylor Street, Kadina, from 10am - 12 noon. Lunch will be provided following the meeting to enable networking among members.
Members should note that the Community Connect Executive will dissolve after implementation of the Community Connect Action Plan once key stakeholders have been trained in managing their allocated data. The Community Connect Committee will then meet every two months and other committees will be established as needed depending on project requirements.
The URI of this document is http://www.community-connect.net/doc/22