Funds needed to get more online | Fraser Coast News | Local News in Fraser Coast

WHEN a federal minister pays a visit to your community organisation the omens are usually more than good.

Jenny Macklin, the minister for families, community services and indigenous affairs, checked out Bay Connect this week when she joined Labor contender Belinda McNeven on the campaign trail.

If Ms Macklin had a chance to check out the home page of the Bay Connect website however, she would have been faced with a much bleaker reality than the official platitudes and smiling faces that greeted her arrival at the Seagulls centre on Bideford Street in Torquay.

Without the funds to launch an advertising campaign, Bay Connect co-ordinator Karen Chatfield (pictured) has placed a last-ditch request on the website seeking sponsorship or funding to keep the beleaguered community service doors open.

“I don’t know how much longer I can go on like this,” she said.

“We have had very little funding for five years and absolutely nothing in the last year.

“The Work for the Dole program kept us going until last July when everyone was sent on holidays.

“It was the longest running Qld program of its kind.

“We have to do something. I can sustain it for another six months. Maybe.”

Ms Chatfield says $25,000 would be enough to keep the show on the road.

“We’re not looking for big bucks.”

On a shoestring budget Bay Connect has trained more than 5000 people, many of them elderly, in the basics of computer knowledge since the project was launched 10 years ago in tandem with the age of the internet.

But as its scope has extended – it now has 40 volunteers – funding has gone the other way.

During her visit Ms Macklin highlighted a number of government programs through which Bay Connect could apply for funding, including a National Volunteers grant and Broadband for Seniors program.

Ms Chatfield says it’s not nearly as simple as that.

“We don’t seem to fit into a section where we can get funding to continue the programs.” She stresses the word “continue”.

On Thursday she set up a stall at the Hervey Bay recycling centre at 6am and ran a sausage sizzle through the day to raise funds.

“If we had $20,000 to $25,000, I could fundraise the rest.”