Flaxmere’s True Colours

The suburb of Flaxmere in Hastings New Zealand has had its fair share of notoriety as a hot-bed of social unrest both in the past and recently. The last time was because a number of its youth (comprised of students from Flaxmere College and Hastings Boys High School) got involved in a fight that was watched by many and participated in by a few.

The rounded up figure equated to the highly emotive “brawl” pieces in the written, electronic and televised mediums that day and the following. To be fair to the media, 200 youth gathering in one place with more intent for ill than good would have gotten my attention too, but what wasn’t fair to the rest of the Flaxmere population was the media scrum that followed.

It seemed to me as a casual observer that the rest of the population was getting tarred and feathered by the same brush too. There’s a great injustice to me in that assumption. Why? Because there are a great many good things going on in this community as well!

The Primary Schools are a breath of fresh air, I can only comment on those I’ve visited but Flaxmere Primary School (weeks after my visit I still have the words to a song they sang in their successful stage production of Jack And the Beanstalk barnstorming around in my head), “Flaxmere kids can do anything, anything …” it’s a sentiment I applaud, ABSOLUTELY!

PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY

I’ve always believed that personal responsibility can make a way where there is no way. My children will tell you that I regard personal responsibility as an above-the-line attribute in who they become as people. They will also tell you I consider blaming others, name calling and all other manner of side-stepping our ownership of what happens to us a below-the-line cop out behaviour. In short, actions have consequences.

At Petershead School I absolutely admired the bi-lingual agility of both its staff and children during their book presentation. Make no bones about it, those children exemplified everything fresh and enthusiastic and sponge-like about good guidance from strong educators.

Nothing peeves me more than guilt by association. Nothing annoys me even more than that except an attribution of labels that begin with some basis and gathers momentum to eventually end up being considered fact! One of the problems I see with sites like Wikipedia is the fact that wikipedians (however well meaning) pronounce stuff and by numerous acts of the repeated re-telling those pronouncements seem to end up becoming fact. Like this oft repeated example below:

FLAXMERE

“Flaxmere was built to cater to the housing demand of Hastings. Flaxmere was intended to be an upper-middle class subdivision but because land was subdivided into smaller lots it turned into a low income neighbourhood, with the highest crime rate and poverty levels in the Napier-Hastings metro area.”

First things first, the leeming-leap that writer attempts from ‘intention’ by planners to make Flaxmere an upper middle class subdivision and the eventuality that it was subdivided and made into smaller lots and by inference it would seem turned into a low income neighbourhood is absurd! Biggest load of wonky logic I’ve seen in while!! But people believe it because it “sounds” right.

Then there’s the ‘highest crime rate’ aspersion, “The Hastings District Crime Profile (Bevin, 2007) states the leading four categories are theft, burglary, property destruction and car conversion. The main locations for residential burglaries are Flaxmere, Camberley, Mayfair/Parkvale, Raureka, Mahora and Akina.

The Hastings District Crime Profile (Bevin, 2007) states that Camberley is rated as a 10 on the Social Deprivation Scale … one of the most deprived areas in the Hastings District” (Hastings District Council, n.d., p. 2).

The NZDep2006 Index of Deprivation ordinal scale ranges from 1 to 10, where 1 represents the areas with the least deprived scores and 10 the areas with the most deprived scores. In relation to Flaxmere there doesn’t appear to be a rating though in reality, I’m sure there is, there is only the comment that the Hastings District Crime Profile (Bevin, 2007) does not indicate where the young offenders reside.”

According to Brian Easton, “well known independent scholar especially interested in New Zealand and whose writings and research are especially concerned with its economics, history, politics, sociology and culture, there is no official “poverty line” in NZ as there is in other countries (e.g. USA) and no formal agreement about exactly how to measure poverty.”

He says, “there is general consensus however, that the strongest indicator of poverty is your level of income. There is also some consensus that an income level set at 60% of median household disposable income after housing costs is a reasonable level of income to protect people from the worst effects of poverty (e.g. this is the measure adopted by the Government‟s Social Report). NZCCSS believes that any poverty measure set lower than this is too low (e.g. the OECD uses a 50% measure for its international comparisons).”

He goes on to say, “it is possible to calculate that the poverty line after deducting housing costs for a household with two adults and two children lies at $442 per week or $23,000 annually in 2008 dollars. For a sole parent with one child it is $286 per week or $14,900 annually in 2008 dollars. Ask yourself – he says, how would I get by if I had to provide for myself and family out of an income less than this? This is the daily reality for hundreds of thousands of people in New Zealand.” And I would further add, not just to families living in Flaxmere.

So can they move passed being in a low decile school to better things? Yes, with consistent encouragement and guidance from family and community role models and against all the social odds. Can they expect to earn a wage that exceeds the current comparative rate to surrounding centres? Yes, with application and determination. Can they expect to travel outside their suburb or even into the vast beyond? Yes they can, when they choose. Life is always about choice, no matter what anyone else says.

FLAXMERE’S TRUE COLOURS

Flaxmere’s true colours are NOT gang colours despite the presence of those individuals among the wider community population. Neither are they set in concrete founded on factual omission. No, Flaxmere’s true colours may be seen in her ability to nurture her young away from stereotypes and toward the more affirming consideration that “Flaxmere kids CAN infact do anything! ANYTHING!

UPDATE

At the end of 2010 long-serving Councillor, Keriana Poulain retired. She was succeeded in her vacated seat by her daughter, Councillor Jacoby Poulain.