|
While we are a business focused on the supply of Australian steel, we also recognise the importance of providing support to the wider community. We support local communities by providing:
|
 |
AEIOU Thanks Hills Holdings & Employees for Generous Donation
8th August 2012
Orrcon Steel recently had the pleasure of presenting $24,500 to the AEIOU Foundation on behalf of the Hills Holdings Group.
The AEIOU Foundation provides Queensland’s only fulltime early education program for children between the ages of 2-1/2 and 5 years with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).
Alan Smith, CEO of the foundation, expressed his thanks of the much-needed support. “We are delighted and grateful for this incredible support for our service and families. The donation of $24,500 will go towards play items for AEIOU’s centres throughout Queensland,” commented Mr Smith.
“These items ensure a wide variety of gross motor skills activities are available for the children, complementing other vital learning goals of the AEIOU program. Thank you to Hills Holdings and those employees who contribute to the Charity Support Scheme for this generous donation.”
AEIOU supports over 200 children throughout centres across Queensland. Around 75% of all children who complete the program transition to mainstream education. For more information on AEIOU visit http://aeiou.org.au/
Hills Holdings Charity Support Scheme
This donation to AEIOU was one of many contributions made to charitable foundations through the Hills Holdings Charity Support Scheme.
This support scheme is built upon donations from employees across all Hills businesses - matched dollar for dollar by Hills Holdings.
This year, the Hills Holdings Charity Support Scheme provided a range of support to the following charities:
Ronald McDonald House – Perth
William Rose School – NSW
Cara – WA
The Royal Women’s Hospital – VIC
Kath Dickson Family Centre Flood Relief
During the course of January's devastating flood disaster in South East Queensland, the Kath Dickson Family Centre in Toowoomba was – like many community centres – caught in the disaster
Hills Holdings has come to the rescue of the Centre by providing a donation from the Hills Charity Scheme of $45,968 – to help re-build a sensory garden and replace a vehicle swept away in the floods.
"The donation is enormous in helping us to get back to a full service offering". The funds raised came from staff of Hills Holdings business units, which were matched dollar for dollar by parent company Hills Holdings.
Living Through Cyclone Yasi
We had to clear all the outside racks and yards of tonnes of material and strap products to racks to ensure they did not become missiles. All the staff worked until 3pm on the Tuesday. We decided at that point there was little else we could do. We had chained and bolted all the warehouse doors and reversed trucks up against them. Our main concern was the predicted tidal surge of several metres of water, which would put the shed a metre under water.
The guys did all this preparation, knowing they still had to go home and try to secure their own houses. Everyone exchanged phone numbers and offered their co workers assistance even though they had not yet done their own houses. It was very good to see how close the team worked through this and reinforced what a great group we have in FNQ.
Most of the staff worked until midnight and beyond barricading windows and doors and securing items in their own yards. After grabbing a few hours sleep, we were all up around 4am to continue preparing.
It is not until you are in a region under cyclone threat that you realise how much needs to be done to prepare your home. Taking blades off outdoor ceiling fans, removing outside furniture, taping windows, putting away wheelie bins, making safe pets and their accessories, children's toys, pot plants, removing television aerials - the list goes on. Anything not bolted down would be blown away by the predicted 280 kilometre winds and even some things that are bolted down were expected to still get blown away.
By mid-morning Wednesday the news was the cyclone was heading further south and brought some relief to most of us even though we knew it would be at the expense of other towns and people. I was satisfied after calling my team that they were prepared as well as they could be. So all that was left by Wednesday afternoon was to bunker down and wait it out.
We all listened and watched the cyclone news and it was evident we had dodged a bullet and the Tully region was instead about to be totally devastated. Although we missed the worst of it in Cairns, the sound of the wind at 150kilometres an hour with trees snapping and buildings groaning kept us awake until 3 am.
The dim light of Thursday morning at 5.30am enabled us to be up and out to assess the damage and start the clean up work. All but one staff member were without power for between 2-4 days- that meant our fridge food had to be cooked on the gas BBQ or thrown out. A phone around that morning of my team assured me that no-one had suffered any structural damage, but all had significant tree damage.
For me it was a long tiring day helping neighbours clean their yards and then my own yard and the rest of the street by cutting trees up that were across the road, dodging power lines along the way so we could actually drive out of the area to then check on the businesses.
We re-opened the business on the Friday with all staff on deck, even though they had no power and still a lot of work to do in their own yards and surrounding streets.
It was a credit to the team to work the way they did. Also to the management and staff of Orrcon Steel and from other areas, as there were many emails and phone calls checking on everyone's wellbeing before and after the event.
It made the Cairns staff feel part of a bigger team and most of all made their efforts feel appreciated and worthwhile. Thank-you to all