Leading from the front issuu

DOWNTOWN Y DAYS —
TURNING LIVES AROUND
by jason mill
Chris and Pat Mill are my grandparents. I started doing
Māori Warden work with them when I was about 15 years
old. When I first went out with them though I was eight!
Chris — my Pa — always spoke of Pat with a warm heart;
there was never a bad word mentioned about Pat. Chris
often spoke too about the work they did with Wally Hunt,
using old shearing sheds out in the country and taking
kids out there for the weekend, teaching them how to
hunt, gather food and fish for eel. At Pa’s tangi there was
a person who spoke about being a troubled youth who
spent time with Chris, Pat and Wally, and how being with
them at that time forever turned his life around.
A STRUGGLE
WITHOUT
SOLUTION?
In 1974 (May 18) Jill McCracken from the NZ Listener wrote
a two part feature called Māori Youth: The Struggle for
Identity. Introducing the first article headed Statues &
Stigma she wrote, “Establishment of identity within the
confines of another’s society isn’t always easy. The struggle
of some Māori youths in this respect is fairly widespread
in New Zealand. Too often, it is a struggle without
solution, but in Hawke’s Bay this is beginning to change.
In Napier especially a group of people have experimented
in ways which could have significance for the rest of the
country”. The following article Do Something, or Forget It
examines what was happening and the initiatives’ place at
the Downtown Y in more detail and the Moteo Youth Club;
examines what’s happening and the initiative’s place in
the future.
By offering places where youth could connect, learn
and grow, these ‘experiments’ were mostly successful, but
in time they faltered through lack of support and funding.
Most people interviewed said without support there was
little hope — heart breaking for all involved. These experiments
showed how early intervention can stop the march
to borstals and jail with the costs to the government and
society much less in the long run. Despite it all, McCracken
found Pat remained confident about the future. “…Pat
#PAT-SPEAK:
AWARENESS WAS
LACKING
The film Once We’re Warriors was around at
this time and its content was no surprise to our
rangatahi. Most Pakeha had no knowledge of Te
Tiriti O Waitangi and how colonisation and urbanisation
had affected Māori. There was much
trauma and following migration to the cities,
the public bar became the meeting place. Politicians
mostly responded by getting tough on
crime and building more prisons. There wasn’t
a lot of awareness but schools were teaching,
Ko Tahi Tataou, ‘We are one’.
Magill, who tends to see complete
answers in schemes
such as Hawke’s Bay Community
College planned for
next year [1975], in an urban
marae, or maybe, in a
professionally run YMCA”.
McCracken is obviously unfamiliar
with Pat’s strength
of optimism and his determination
to believe that
anything is possible.
Above: Chris and Pat Mill — Māori Warden legends in Ahuriri.
Napier YMCA transformed and the Downtown Y is born 79