Health project winds up

THE Yarra Valley Practitioners Project has announced it will close on Friday, 24 August.
The YVPP was established after the 2009 bushfires with practitioners volunteering their time to provide free counselling, health and business support in bushfire affected communities.
The project has been on the verge of closing at various times during its three and a half year operation. However it was given a life-line to operate through 2011 when the new Baillieu government came good with an election promise to provide $450,000 funding.
Mr Baillieu said at the time the YVPP supporters and volunteers were an extraordinary group of people who had provided a service to people in genuine need.
Ms Dickson said in May this that over the past three years more than 170 volunteer practitioners had seen hundreds of clients and that in January and February, 64 new clients had signed on.
A further $150,000 grant was made to the group in the State budget in May with Bushfire Minister and deputy premier Peter Ryan saying it would allow the YVPP to extend its services for a limited time.
Founder and president Karen Dickson said the group’s philosophy of “locals helping locals” had held true every single day of YVPP’s existence.
“It has been a great pleasure to experience clients, complementary health care practitioners, community members, our many volunteers, businesses and politicians banding together to support YVPP and helping the recovery of the bushfire affected communities,” Ms Dickson said.
She said a number of the YVPP practitioners would continue to see clients in their private practices.