Hills Community Aid’s New Bus ‘Rosa’
After 22 years of service from their old wheels, Hills Community Aid launched their new bus on Wednesday March 27th with a huge turnout from the local community.
The new Mitsubishi bus, already affectionately known as ‘Rosa’ by members of HCA, was purchased by the group through $50,000 given by the NSW Government’s Community Building Partnership grant program and a $30,000 allocation from the Hills Shire Council. The remaining $30,000 was raised by Hills Community Aid.
Mici Beer, Executive Officer of Hills Community, led the ceremony and shared her excitement at seeing the brand new bus available to support the community: “Everybody’s very excited about our new bus, and we’re looking forward to continuing our mission of serving the needs of our community and fostering a sense of belonging while creating memorable experiences.”
Rosa has a significant amount of benefits over the old HCA bus, including additional seats, air conditioning for all seats on the bus, an automatic transmission system and a navigation system; a feature which the volunteer drivers are very excited about. Rosa is expected to be in operation six days a week and transport around 20,000 people per year.
Mici told Hills to Hawkesbury Community News about the journey to securing the bus for HCA, which she described as a ‘mission’: “We were very fortunate to receive the funding from the NSW Government and Hills Shire Council, and with $110,000 in our pocket we went looking for a bus.
“And though it took us eight months and a lot of learning about buses, we found the perfect vehicle for us. We found a bus that didn’t have a lot of kilometres on it and hadn’t been involved in any accidents. And now today, we have our Rosa!”
Hills Shire Mayor Peter Gangemi was present at the launch of the bus, commenting on why Council believes it’s important to allocate funding to groups like HCA. He said: “It’s a real team effort for a project like this. What I particularly love about this project is that we often get grant requests for incredibly worthy events and activities, but this is a great piece of hardware that will serve the community for 10 or 15 years.
“It’s an incredible investment to keep the community more connected and to build more memories. I’m personally very excited – we’re looking forward to seeing the team transporting our community members to locations within The Hills and beyond.”
Rosa’s maiden voyage was on Tuesday April 2nd, taking members of the community to Fagan Park. Other planned trips include visits to Katoomba, the Central Coast, Wollongong and the Tulip Festival in Canberra.
* The Hills Community Aid Family Fun Day is also happening on Wednesday April 17th.
