Welcome to CDAH's weekly newsletter!

Hi all, in the lead up to our AGM, we have a message from our President:
What an incredible year at CDAH! We have moved from strength to strength over the last year to build the peer led movement in the Hunter.

Some of the highlights of the last year:

We now have over 100 members - people like you who want Australia to be a place where everyone is committed to inclusion.
38 people graduated from our peer mentor training course in February.
Over 60 peer mentoring relationships are up and running.
We ran weekly Peer2Peer meetings in a range of places - Maitland, Newcastle, Charlestown and Wallsend.
Our Planning Cafe's ran each fortnight between Maitland and Charlestown.
Over the next two years, with funding from FACS, we can continue our important work here in the Hunter. As our wonderful Coordinator Cath Mahony says,

"We know that peer support helps people to dream big and to achieve our goals so we're going to keep working as hard as we can at CDAH so that peer support does become a really important option for people. Not just something that happens every now and again. That it's the first place that people can go to get information and ideas from people who really understand their lives. We believe, and we already know from our own experience, that through peer support we can bring about great changes in each others' lives...
and genuine acceptance and respect from our community, which is what everyone with disability is really striving for."
Being part of a local, grass roots peer led movement has been really important to me over the last year. I look forward to the year ahead and I really hope you will think about getting more involved with CDAH. You might even think about becoming a Board member. THANK YOU for being a member of CDAH!

Deb,
CDAH President.

Speak Up Hunter - Wallsend Peer2Peer meeting
Friday 4 November - Wallsend Library, 30 Bunn St, Wallsend.
10am - 12pm.

CDAH AGM and "Our Choice, Our Voice-Talking About the NDIS" Film Launch.
Saturday 12 November - The Place Community Centre, Frederick Street, Charlestown.
Film Launch 12.30pm
AGM 1.30pm.
View the text only flyer
View the PDF flyer
Please RSVP to info@cdah.org.au or 0
Peer Support to Buy Support - Charlestown Peer2Peer meeting.
Tuesday 15 November - The Place Community Centre, Frederick Street, Charlestown.
10am - 12pm.

Maitland November Planning Cafe- Finding, hiring and keeping your own support workers.
Wednesday 16 November - Club Maitland City
14 Arthur Street, Rutherford.
10am - 12pm.

Charlestown November Planning Cafe- Finding, hiring and keeping your own support workers.
Thursday 24 November - The Place Community Centre, Frederick Street, Charlestown.
10am - 12pm.

Our Planning Cafes and Peer2Peer meetings are brought you in partnership with PDCN (Physical Disability Council of NSW).

Starting Your Own Business

Thanks to all who got involved in CDAH's Planning Cafe at Charlestown last week. It was great to showcase such enthusiasm and motivation for people with disability running their own businesses and four fantastic businesses who are kicking goals. Watch this space-we are currently putting together some information about the businesses we presented and some exciting links to get started in your own business. Let's do it!

Take a survey on self-managing!
Shout out to anyone who is self-managing their NDIS Plan and who wants to have their say about what is and isn’t working.

Please take 5 minutes to complete this survey. We will give your feedback to the NDIA. And share the link with anyone else who might be interested. We have been getting some fantastic responses so far, so please get all of your responses in by this Wednesday 2 November.
We appreciate your help with this. Let’s all work together to make this better for all of us.
Thanks a lot!
Click Here to take the survey!

AGM and "Our Choice Our Voice-Talking About the NDIS" Film Launch
Come along to support us, your local user led disability support organisation run for & by people with disability.You’re welcome to stay for our AGM after the film launch.
Please note: Only members can vote at our AGM.

Saturday 12 November - The Place Community Centre, Frederick Street, Charlestown.
Film Launch 12.30pm
AGM 1.30pm.
View the text only flyer
View the PDF flyer

Artist with Disability Fellowship
The Artist with Disability Fellowship ($30,000) is offered by the State Government, in consultation with Accessible Arts, to enable a professional NSW artist with disability to undertake a self-directed program of professional development.
Applications for the 2017 Artist with Disability Fellowship close on Monday 19 December 2016.
For more information about the application process go to the Arts NSW website.

NOT MY PLACE, IS IT YOURS?
Opening of the Not My Place exhibition on Saturday 5 November 2-4pm at The Stage in The Emporium, 185 Hunter St Mall, Newcastle.
View the flyer here.

Hey I’m Erin. I like hanging out with my friends and painting.

Being able to talk to people and be a mentor and get the message out there about how people with disability are people first, we are all the same.

That everyone should get treated the same way, no matter who they are or what they do. No matter whether they have a disability or not really.

I went to one of their workshops about the NDIS with my mum, and we got to speak to people about their experiences in their lives and I learnt that I’m not all by myself. We weren’t all alone in our struggles we were having with the NDIS.
Then I started going to their meetings, then the peer mentor training, then I became a mentor and now I am working as a peer mentor at Stockton and Tomaree.

Stop playing with us like toys, start listening to us, we are human beings.

I think you should see the person before you see the disability. You should meet each person as an individual.

“Not Pretty Enough?” by Kasey Chambers. I like country music and to me it means you can just be yourself, you don’t have to be what other people expect you to be.

Feedback is important to CDAH. It helps us to do things better. Please tell us what you think about what we do, good or bad, so we can keep working to improve things.