Havelock North Function Centre celebrates a quarter of a century

Havelock North Function Centre trust member Peggy Van Asch and Havelock North Function Centre manager Lynda Jones are ready to celebrate 25 years of community. Photo / Warren Buckland

After 25 years of being the place for almost any community event, the Havelock North Function Centre will host its own celebration of its origins and those who helped make the centre a possibility.

Havelock North Function Centre manager Lynda Jones has been with the centre for 23 of its 25-year history and explained she has seen the purpose-built building cater to the community in the way it was built to do.

“The function centre is a community facility with a wide variety of people using the space, from the smallest and most recreational, to the largest and high-end events,” Jones said.

Peggy Van Asch has been a Community Centre Trust Board member since day one and said she remembers how fantastic it was that locals pitched in by buying a concrete block, with some people buying a concrete block each month.

The people who fundraised all those years ago so that the Havelock North Function Centre is what it is today are the reasons why Van Asch and Jones want to celebrate the 25 years of success the centre has had.

“There is a sense of ownership by, probably older, members of the Havelock North community because they really did get behind it, and we are having this celebration now because we are aware that a lot of those people who were involved are getting on in age and it’s an opportunity to go down memory lane,” Van Asch said.

Havelock North Function Centre was made by the community for the community.

Jones has been tracking down those who helped get the project off the ground and said, “reaching out to these people, by both email and phone, locating them has been a bit difficult, however, the enthusiastic response has been there”.

The Havelock North Function Centre celebration is a chance for people to come in and take a look at the large static display that Jones has made with pictures and information from the archives.

“It’s also an opportunity for people who were involved to share or those interested to learn more about the history of the place, as so many people use this and I don’t think everyone knows the history behind it,” Jones said.

Local Hawke’s Bay historian Michael Fowler will be at the celebration to talk about the history of the centre, however, Jones and Van Acsh spoke with the Hastings Leader about what they remember.

The two women explained that back in 1991, the Havelock North community felt like it was running out of space for community groups to meet. It was decided the village needed a function centre that would work for all kinds of groups of people, and the Community Centre Trust Board was formed.

The community got behind the project in 1994 and people started fundraising in any way they could. Kids would have lemonade stands, schools took part in coin days and bake sales, and the community also held cocktail parties, dances, concerts and fairs to raise money.

Havelock North Function Centre underwent a few changes over its 25 years.

With a sponsorship committee set up, funding kicked into gear as the group started applying for sponsorship and grants from organisations and philanthropic trusts. The Hastings District Council was also financially involved and once the trust raised a certain amount, the council donated the land the function centre sits on.

Van Asch said: “After four years of very committed locals and a lot of hard work fundraising, construction on the Function Centre was completed in 1998.”

Jones said, “We had a very supportive Hastings Mayor at the time, Jeremy Dwyer, who was instrumental in getting it all going for us. When the centre was built, the trust gifted the building to the council, so it’s actually a council facility but it’s run independently by a trust.”

Once the building was completed, the centre was a bare shell. It didn’t even have a front counter. The community pulled together again and slowly a wish list of items for inside the space was ticked off one by one and donated by locals.

“When we first opened, people would come in and they did feel as though it was their building because they had contributed in some way,” Van Asch said.

“In the beginning the centre was run by volunteers, as people just wanted to do what they could to help. Since then it has grown quite well and the trust has done a lot of upgrades.

“The trust makes sure to pile the money back into the facility as we believe that’s the way a community space should be run,” Jones said.

The building manager explained there were nay-sayers in the beginning, but after a year or two some of the people who actually doubted that the community really needed the space came in and admitted they were wrong.

Looking into the future, Van Asch and Jones just see the Havelock North Function Centre getting busier and busier.

“It is always full, a lot of the time we only have half an hour between groups coming in to use the space,” Jones said.

The Havelock North Function Centre invites all to celebrate 25 years on Sunday, September 17 from 11am to 3pm at 30 Te Mata Road, Havelock North 4130.

There will be a display of archival materials and a presentation from historian Michael Fowler at 2pm.