INDIGENOUS STORYBOOK

Langford Aboriginal
Association
ORGANISATION NAME:
Langford Aboriginal Association (LAA)
Contact Person:
Angela Ryder
Email and Website:
manager@laalangford.com.au;
admin@laalangford.com.au
Key Staff / People Involved:
Angela Ryder, Jill Abdullah
Key words:
Heart of our Community
About the storyteller…
Angela Ryder is the Chairperson of the
Langford Aboriginal Association and the
manager of Aboriginal Programs with
Relationships Australia. She is a Nyoongar
woman who is originally from Katanning but
has lived and worked in Perth for 26 years. She
works to ensure equitable access to services
for all Aboriginal people.
About Langford Aboriginal
Association Inc…
Langford Aboriginal Association is a not for
profit community organisation which delivers
programs to benefit the local Aboriginal and
non–Aboriginal community.
form Langford Aboriginal Association (LAA) for the
many Aboriginal community members in the area,
and in 2000 we subsequently became incorporated.
Becoming incorporated put us in a position to apply
for independent funding.
LAA Health Program
Once upon a time…
back in the late 1990’s, I became involved in an
organisation called Boogurlarri Community House,
which has since been named the William Langford
Community House. During my time on their
committee, which was mainly comprised of non-
Aboriginal people, management decided it would
be beneficial to access Aboriginal funding. The
Aboriginal community members also believed there
weren’t enough services in the area (within the
City of Gosnells) for Aboriginal people so it was
suggested that we form an Aboriginal Association so
that we could assist the mainstream organisation to
access Aboriginal funding. Although Boogurlarri had
an Aboriginal name, the services weren’t specifically
for Aboriginal people. Given this, it made sense to
I was appointed the inaugural Chairperson. After the
first year I stepped down, however, I resumed my
tenure in 2002, and have remained in the position
since. We formed LAA with an aim to provide
services and programs for Aboriginal people. Our
initial grant was for $3000, and I remember how
excited and proud we felt when we secured this
funding. We have since recorded our journey
through photos and we captured the first of our
gatherings together where we made candles, had
a pampering session and a big social event with
lots of Aboriginal people coming together; it was
really wonderful and it was the first step in the LAA
journey.
And then one day…
the Boogurlarri management committee decided
that LAA needed to find its own space to operate
from, and we were asked to find a premises in a
short period of time. It was a shock at the time but
in hindsight, it was definitely for the best. We started
looking for a new location to run the organisation
and found the fantastic space we are in now. Back
then, it was a Noongar Kindergarten but only a small
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