Kapitbahayan Coop (NSW-Australia)  turns 20 on July 18, 2015!

By Richard J Ford
NSW-Australia
June 23, 2015



The Kapitbahayan Cooperative Ltd. (KCL) is perhaps the most successful organisation in the Filipino-Australian community in terms of social significance, long-term community benefits, value of assets, awards and promotional value. The KCL strongly promotes the social character of a Filipino village, very compliant with all the legal and financial requirements, follows democratic procedures and is in the forefront of the growth and development of the social /community housing sector.

The former Executive Director of the Association to Resource Cooperative Housing (ARCH), Karine Shellshear, recently emailed:   “Vision and direction doesn't happen easily,  but you guys make it look extremely viable and do-able! Well done! ...A great group of people who aspire to all that it is possible ... and a great leader that surely makes it happen!  Best thoughts to you all! “

Registered as Kapitbahayan Filipino Cooperative Limited with the Office of Fair Trading’s Registry of Cooperatives in 6 July 1995 with about 15 newly- arrived Filipino migrants as members, KCL now is managing five rental property clusters: Auburn, Berala, Wentworthville, Merrylands and Canley Vale.  This cooperative manages for the government rental units to multicultural families with children, elderly couples and single mums who earn low to middle incomes.  A Board of Management composed of tenant-members are annually elected by the general membership to manage all the properties voluntarily and assisted by the members who are trained and organised to function through committee systems.

What makes this organisation highly-regarded everywhere are the many performance-based service awards it garnered over the years at the national, state and even international levels. KCL is the only Filipino community organisation in Southern Hemisphere (New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific Islands) that won the ABS-CBN Global Bayaning Filipino award in 2012. It is the only housing coop that was able to use its operational savings as sweat equity to buy the land that the Canley Vale property was built on. Almost every year it receives Excellence in Housing awards in various categories.

Ruben Amores, KCL founding president was recently awarded the NSW Premier’s medal for Lifetime of Community Service for his voluntary work with KCL, Auburn Small Community Organisations Network Inc and APCO where he was founding chair and current president, respectively.  Dr Cen Amores, KCL Membership Development Committee chair and APCO founding president was named ZEST Most Outstanding Voluntary Leader of Greater Western Sydney in 2013, People of Australia Ambassador 2012 and ZEST Ambassador in 2014.

KCL has been featured, cited and visited by various groups because of  its innovative role in housing, community organising and even in house design.  It has helped organised other coops including the Filipino-run Sedgwick Housing Coop and other ethnic groups. Its members are also active in various community activities and its facilities are utilised as meeting venues of APCO affiliates.  

Kapitbahayan Coop has lived up to its meaning - as a neighbourhood that every Filipino should be proud of!