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Morning Parents, Siblings, Guardians, my HOD’s, and last but by no means least, the Home’s Board.
It’s lovely to see such a large turnout and I hope to get the chance to connect personally with those of you I don’t often see. Please seek me out, I’d welcome the chance to talk to you all today.
The year has certainly flown by, and we have been kept busy ensuring that the home runs as smoothly as possible. With this having been my second year in the role I must say I have enjoyed it a lot more, and it’s certainly been full of significant projects and activities.
We have had several staff join us over the course of the year. Mar-Louise took over from Buzz as House Mother of De Smidt and has settled in well. Sharon and Debbie joined the Medical Team, replacing Anthia and Sally. Lisa has taken over the bookkeeping functions from Elaine; and Stephanie has replaced Karen on reception, who has moved across to OT. Elaine, Gita, Precious and Shamil all retired during the year. We wish them all the best and thank them for their service to Sunfield.
I would like to particularly thank my HOD’s and Graham, now from Feedem, for their ongoing support and commitment. It really is appreciated.
Feedem has now been in place for 8 months and most of the teething problems have been ironed out. We appreciate the renewed focus having them on-site has brought. With me and the admin team not dealing with ongoing day-to-day labour challenges it has enabled us to restructure, reduce admin costs and focus more strategically. Our arrangement with them still enables us to benefit from food sharing from both Woolworths and Checkers, which has helped contain food costs. Thank you, Graham, for embracing this change!
After last year’s AGM we trialed running the Durban bus in the first half of the year with great success. With the July program and the concert, we did not run a bus as the residents have been busy. However, we will be looking to run the bus again towards the end of Oct / early Nov.
Tania and I recently visited the Western Cape and visited 8 similar homes. With us being in a different province they were very open and shared information freely. We were encouraged by what we saw, how relevant our Vision is, and how fortunate we are. It also enabled us to see where we can improve and we’ve developed a plan for the new workshops that involves identifying Champions, who may be current Staff, or even volunteers who are willing to impart their knowledge. If you have skills in wood-working; baking; handcrafts etc, do connect with Tania to see if you can share your knowledge to further upskill the staff.
We do hope you all have an opportunity today to walk around the new workshops, which are getting close to completion. Our workshop rotation programme has been very successful and will continue when we move into the new facilities. We’ve decided to extend the rotation period to 6-8 weeks to allow residents more time to finish their projects.
Tim Smeeton continues to have residents work in his dairy every Thursday and, with a new group going every second week, it gives all the residents an opportunity to try their hand at farming, which they all enjoy. In Summer Tim also assists the Green Gang in the veggie tunnels, and this contributes to our food stores, as well as providing seedlings for sale via the shop.
Night to Shine was again a great success and I’d like to extend a huge thank you to Jackie Peters who pulls it together. The Howick Community Church needs mentioning too as they host the event and assist with the catering and venue set up. Tania coordinates the Sunfield end of the event and spends hours with all the invites and paperwork that goes hand in hand with something of this nature. Thank you, Tania!
We continue to do the Amber Glen market every second week with visits to the Care Centre. Our Residents have been invited to play pool and table tennis with their residents, and this has been well received and will continue on a regular basis. We took our concert to both Amber Valley and Amber Glen last year, and this year we invited the Ambers to Sunfield to watch it. Thank you to FoSH and the Ambers for their ongoing support. We appreciate these links into the community at large and hope to continue building on it in the year ahead. Both the markets and our Shop, under the guidance of Barbara Higgins, Pam Christie, Les Thurtell, and their band of happy ladies, continue to be a shining light for the Home and we truly appreciate their hard work and the rewards it brings.
Howick Prep and Howick High are always very supportive of Sunfield and we are invited to watch most of their shows and plays. The Howick High Choir has visited Sunfield and performed for us in the hall and we are grateful to have them right across the road.
We have started Recycling on a small scale and hope to grow this significantly in 2026. Our visit to the Cape highlighted how profitable recycling can be. Some homes offer a shredding service, which they get paid for, and then benefit from the paper that is sold. I do think they have a better infrastructure for it, which we don’t have in KZN. However, one home on whitepaper alone receives R15k a month. This is an area we will continue to explore and will call upon you to support in the New Year.
Sunfield has partnered with an organization called Singakwenza, an organization that focuses on Early Childhood Education in less fortunate communities. They make toys and educational games from recycled materials that can be sourced where they live. We have been able to help by making several toys, which they then distribute. This is a wonderful example of NGO’s working together for mutual gain. I’d like to thank Julie Hay and her team for offering us this opportunity.
Our Mayfair was a success raising R55k, plus the Shop had an outstanding day. I do hope you have all put our Christmas Lights dates in your diaries and encourage friends and families to come along. These two events are going to be our core focus for 2026 and your support is encouraged. Please chat to other parents in your house and see if you can light up your houses and windows, so visitors over those days have something truly memorable to experience.
On the Estates side; the solar system installed at the beginning of the year has given us savings of between R25-30k a month. Over the last 2 years we have been trying to have our tariff adjusted with the aid of Flux Energy who have also engaged with NERSA. We are aiming to get onto a Time of Use Tariff so our bill can become significantly less. I’d like to thank Murray Burger from Flux Energy for all his support. It’s good to have him fighting in our corner to try to get the tariff corrected.
We are installing heat pumps to supply our geysers, which act as storage units. We hope to achieve significant savings by having larger vessels that are reheated once the solar has kicked in.
While it’s never nice to cut down trees many had become a significant risk to buildings and we decided it was best to do the job in one go so that Shiela Worrall and her gardening team can replant. With the rains having arrived the gardens will flourish, and I’d like to thank Shiela for all the time she puts into our estate beautification project. I’m sure you all agree that we are no longer looking like an institution, but a residential home we can all be proud of.
Before I close there are two key things I’d like to address.
First: While the marketing team continue to work hard and we average 10-15 enquiries a month, we currently have 11 empty beds. I’m sure you can appreciate what filling those beds would do for our financial sustainability, and our ability to provide improved services for Residents. Please, I urge you to reach out to all your contacts and invite people to come and tour the home. We have a wonderful location and a caring team. Let’s find 11 more to join our family so we can all benefit from the security this will bring to everyone.
Second: I would like to focus for a moment on an individual who does not like the limelight. David, our Chair, took on the role of fundraiser for the Schafer project and has done a phenomenal job raising a staggering R13.8 million! Two years ago, I stood here and was awed by the boldness of this initiative, and never did I imagine that we’d have the project completed so quickly. Fundraising is hard at the best of times, however, David’s heart for Sunfield saw him push on despite a lot of rejection. He, and Laurie Kohrs, have achieved the seemingly impossible in the current economic climate. I’d like you all to stand and give Dave a warm round of applause for all his hard work!
To the entire Board, and all of you, I thank you for your support this past year and look forward to an exciting 2026 as we continue to steer Sunfield into the future.
Don Tully
General Manager – Business
Have any questions? Call or email our General Manager, Don Tully.