AGM: Child welfare hopeful of reopening Keep Me Safe House
The Child Welfare aims to do more ground work.
Despite budget constraints, Boksburg Child Welfare continued to touch the lives of many families over the past financial year.
This is according to its director, Nompumelelo Gidela, who gave a report back at the organisation’s AGM on September 16.
“Our responsibility is to ensure we protect and prevent children under the age of 18 from being mistreated or abused. We have seen an increasing number of child abuse cases in Villa Liza, so our social workers are very active in the area,” she said.
Child Welfare has offices in Boksburg CBD, Reiger Park and Vosloorus.
“We also offer services in informal areas and townships. We have a shortage of social workers that results in each one dealing with between 100 and 169 cases at a time. The normal standard should be 60 cases,” explained Gidela.
The Keep Me Safe House, in Boksburg South, may also be reopened, she added.
“We used the house to temporarily house children, who were rescued from appalling conditions. We are appealing to community members and businesses to help us to raise the funds needed to permanently reopen the facility.”
Boksburg Child Welfare initiated several programmes during the 2022/23 financial year, including a teenage pregnancy programme, which ran during school holidays.
Secretary for the organisation Scott Williams presented the financial report.
“The total budget we had for the 2022/23 financial year was R8 492 040, but our expenses were more than our budget – at R9 022 014. This means we are taking debt into our next financial year and these will need to be covered. Our repairs and maintenance budget increased by 41%.
“Under these circumstances, it is important to also understand that the Department of Social Development only covers 80% of our costs. The other 20% we have to raise ourselves,” said Williams.
Long-serving staff and donors were recognised at the AGM and Gidela thanked staff for their hard work, as well as Boksburg Advertiser for its support of their appeals and awareness drives.
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