Good on the Flaxmere community for banding together to come up with possible solutions to the ongoing vandalism in the area.
Instead of cursing and cussing about the negative side of the situation they have been proactive and organised meetings to discuss what can be done.
Asuccessful hui was held last month and following the heartbreaking destruction of the Te Aranga community garden last weekend another was held on Wednesday night.
What struck a chord with me were the words from Dale Ennor who grew up in the area and helped organise the first meeting. She said anger would not solve the problem. How very true.
Instead she asked that the people came along to the meeting with positive ideas on how they could help solve the problems.
It's a bit like a family taking care of family problems but on a much wider scale. Flaxmere councillor Henare O'Keefe hit the nail on the head when he said "there is no such thing as a bad baby so we need to get to the heart of the problem and get back into the home".
The people who live in Flaxmere know who the ratbags are.
Just like any other community they are a minority, most are hard working, honest people who wouldn't dream of breaking windows for fun or worse still ripping up a garden that feeds their neighbours.
Once again we saw the wider community show its generosity and support by donating not only thousands of dollars but their time to rebuild this amazing shared garden.
The garden will be rebuilt because vandals are really no match for the spirit of this community.
