Community Centre gets a Social Enterprise Award

Darragh Fitzgerald, Kilcullen Lions Club, with centre manager Enda O'Neill, Cllr Tracey O'Dwyer, Monika Sustaviciute of The Coffee Hatch, and Peter Nolan and Kevin McBride of Kildare Small Jobs who installed the plaque.

A plaque placed on the outside of Kilcullen Community Centre yesterday signals it as a Social Enterprise, and was awarded recently to mark the contribution the centre has made to the community, writes Brian Byrne.

The award was made by the Kildare Leader Partnership, which provides training and mentoring programmes for social enterprises, using money from the Dormant Accounts Fund.

A Social Enterprise is a company whose objective is to enhance community life in societal or environmental ways rather than maximising profit for its owners or shareholders. It trades through the provision of goods and services, and reinvests surpluses into achieving social objectives.

"Down the decades, the centre has created employment and provided many services within the community," says centre manager Enda O'Neill, who told the Diary they are delighted with the award. He noted the Coffee Hatch initiative as the most recent example of the services which the enterprise has established since its foundation in 1982. "When it was first built the premises was thought to be out on the edge of Kilcullen, now it is a focal point for a wide range of activities." 

Enda O'Neill will be interviewed next week by CB Media for a short video about the Kilcullen Community Centre, which will be distributed through the community and social media network in County Kildare. In addition to the current activities at the centre, he will note the foresight of the Cross & Passion sisters in giving the land for both the centre and the many other sports and social organisations now headquartered on the campus. The fundraising by the community during the 1970s and 1980s to build the facility will also be recalled.

Enda is especially appreciative of the work of volunteers and employees who keep the Community Centre going through the days, months and years. "It's very much a team effort," he emphasises. "It just wouldn't happen without them."

The Old Hardware in Narraghmore was also awarded a Social Enterprise plaque at the same recent event.

Mick Spencer, Monika Sustaviciute and Adam Bermingham who work at the centre.

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