Doonside Senior Citizens Club 50th Anniversary

By Stephen Bali MP

15 August 2024

I congratulate the Doonside Senior Citizens Club, which is celebrating its golden jubilee—50 years of supporting senior citizens and providing a wonderful venue to come together to celebrate life and good friendships. The seniors movement in the Blacktown local government area began in the late 1960s, with some people indicating it started in the Blacktown RSL youth club hall with Percy Saunders and a wonderful couple, Ray and Nora. Doonside formed its club, called the Doonside Activity Club, which catered for the welfare of the aged and pensioners over 40 years of age. The club started in the Doonside Community Hall in 1974. Graham Sweeney was the founder and first president. He later became alderman on Blacktown Municipal Council. As part of his campaign, Graham said his "hopes and aspirations are for better facilities for the aged and children". In his first term on council from 1974 to 1977, he had land set aside for the future seniors hall.

The leadership team of husband and wife Ray and Ronnie Ross followed Graham, with Ronnie as the president and also the driver, picking up and dropping off many of the infirm members, and Ray as treasurer. During that time, John Aquilina was elected mayor in September 1977. He was the mayor when Blacktown changed from a municipality to a city in 1979. Together with the ward 4 councillors at the time, Jim Lynch and Charlie Bali, the Labor team delivered many innovative council buildings, including the new Doonside Senior Citizens Activities Centre in 1980.

The Doonside Seniors presidents following Ray and Ronnie Ross included June Leo and Jim Fraser, and the longest serving president of all was Martha Lynch. For about three decades Martha's leadership kept the club going. Following Martha was her daughter, Josephine. Currently it is led by another husband-and-wife team: president Steven Szmytka and his lovely wife, Lorgia. They have a wonderful team supporting them, including Sajana Nand, Pushpa Nand, Hyacinth Singh, Vijay Nand, Denzil and Lorraine D'Cruz, Clarita Castaneda and Lombarda. Special mention needs to go to Joe and Ann Buckman, who have provided care and support over the years to the seniors. Joe was the driver of the minibus, picking up and dropping off many of the seniors so they can attend the activities.

The Doonside Seniors team have had their challenges over the years. An occasional break-in or fire may have temporarily disappointed them, but their resilience soon had them back on track providing repairs to the centre and support for seniors. Over the years they have undertaken many activities such as board games, darts, indoor bowls, table tennis, bingo, linedancing and exercise—even with chairs. They raise money from activities such as at Doonside Festival, where over the years they have had a stall with arts and crafts or knick‑knack sales. The most popular activities are their bus tours to many destinations and their annual Christmas party.

Doonside Seniors was one of the most engaged groups that campaigned with me over many years for Doonside railway station upgrades. About 30 of them sat in the gallery in this Parliament when we had the petition debate to call on the then Government to "give Doonie a lift". Their advocacy strongly contributed to the then Government reversing its decision and upgrading the station. Doonside Seniors members boast an impressive list of achievers, including Blacktown City Senior Citzen of the Year award winners June Leo in 1994, Marie Jenson in 2008, Martha Lynch in 2009 and Ruth Nicholson in 2018; and Blacktown City Citizen of the Year for 2015, Sajana Nand. The goal is to make members feel welcome and engaged in social activities. After 50 successful years, Doonside Seniors continues to thrive and provide a wonderful centre of activity for our more mature residents who equally just want to have fun. I congratulate Doonside Seniors. I look forwarto another 50 successful years.