Couple work tirelessly for Roebourne’s future

It is hard to keep track of all the things Beth Smith and her husband Marshall have done for the Roebourne community.

Eager to help out and offer support at every opportunity, joining numerous boards and committees and even establishing a dry community for those struggling with alcohol, the Smiths are Roebourne’s power couple.

Mrs Smith moved to the Pilbara when she was 10 after her parents set up a number of schools for indigenous children around the State.

“My parents had connections with a lot of the missions at that time in the 1960s and prior to that Aboriginal kids were not encouraged to do further schooling past primary school,” she said.

Mr Smith, who grew up on stations around WA most of his young life, attended one of Mrs Smith’s parents’ schools.

“A hundred students went through and one of them was my husband — that’s how we met,” Mrs Smith said.

After marrying in the late 1970s and having six children, the Smiths settled in Roebourne and established Mingullatharndo, or Five Mile community, about 10km out of town.

Working as a welfare officer at Roebourne prison at the time, Mr Smith saw indigenous people ending up back in jail and identified the need for a way to escape the alcohol problems that plagued the area.

“We built a house and moved here in 1990 … but we’d been doing some work out there before then,” Mrs Smith said.

“It was just basically a place where they can get away from the pressures of the stuff that leads them back into jail again.”

But the community, which now houses more than 50 people, has faced its share of difficulties.

In 2000, arsenic was discovered in the water supply.

Residents are forced to travel to Roebourne to collect water and had no local access to water for drinking and cooking for 16 years.

The problem went unresolved because Mingullatharndo was established on freehold land as a private Christian community and fell outside State and Federal responsibilities.

“Probably our biggest problem (is that) we’re not a government community and so we’re not recognised by the government — they give us minimal support,” Mrs Smith said.

“I think really the government just doesn’t want to take any responsibility for us.”

Mrs Smith has learnt not to get her hopes up but keeps her head high.

“There’s always challenges,” she said. “It takes work, but it’s just one of those things.”

The Smiths work to improve the social and economic capacity of Mingullathardo resdients by providing them with a range of skills and knowledge.

Mr Smith used to provided horse-handling training, a skill he acquired after years of living on stations.

He is now conducting workshops on the production of Aboriginal artefacts.

The community also houses several artists who go to Roebourne every day to paint.

“Quite a few Yindjibarndi artists actually live out on the community, including Ellery Sandy who is probably the mainstay of the Yindijibarndi art group,” Mrs Smith said.

“She keeps everyone together and everyone moving.”

In March, 2010, the Smiths established a garden nursery in Mingullatharndo with the help of Woodside.

The Pilbara Indigenous Nursery has the capacity of produce tens of thousands of native seedlings every year.

When the nursery opened, Mr Smith said it was set up with the hope of improving the health and viability of the community.

“We want to create long-term opportunities for our community so we identified enterprises which could be operated and staffed by the local indigenous people,” he said.

Mrs Smith said the nursery was a step towards sustainability.

She now works full-time at the Roebourne District High School canteen but hopes she can get back to the nursery soon to give her green thumb a workout.

“(We’re) looking at ways that we might be able to lease the nursery out for a few years just while I get the canteen up and running again,” she said.

“So it’s not going to go away and hopefully it’ll be there in a couple of years when I’ve finished at the canteen (so I can) come back and do it again.

“The idea was to (have) something for people to do on the community.”

On top of her volunteer work, Mrs Smith has been heavily involved with the Pilbara Aboriginal Church, where her husband is a pastor and manages Roebourne’s Community Resource Centre.

“The children’s church is my main focus, but I’ve been involved in other things, including the op-shop and the book shop,” she said.

Mr Smith was instrumental in establishing the resource centre and its first chairman.

The Smiths have been working to restore the centre to a hub of activity.

“There’s funding available but it just needs some people to get their heads together,” Mrs Smith said.

“I like the community side of the resource centre.

“It’s a place where people can come and use computers or email or fax or phones or whatever and people just drop in to talk and yarn and stuff like that.

“Hopefully very shortly that will be up and running again with a good, strong committee.”

Mrs Smith also tried her hand at local politics, running for council last year.

“I didn’t get in, but it was probably a good thing,” she said.

“I’m a strong believer for things (happening) when they’re supposed to happen.

“That doesn’t stop me — I do a lot of stuff in the community as well, so we’re busy establishing our local community association.”

The Roebourne Community Association is in the process of being established as a committee of local members who act as the voice for people in the town.

Mrs Smith says the association will be an important tool for empowering people who have been on the outer for so long.

“I like to see people building their capacity and stuff like that and hopefully all that I do is towards the betterment of people and the community,” she said.

The association held public meetings every Sunday in February with the aim of giving Roebourne residents a platform to have their voices heard.

“It was about the third community meeting we had when people started grabbing the microphone and talking and you think wow, this is really good — people that have been disempowered for so long (are) starting to see that they can make a difference.”

When Mrs Smith was asked where her motivation to work tirelessly and selflessly for her community comes from, there was a long pause.

“I’m crazy,” she eventually joked.

“You get your values from what your parents were and that was the way we were brought up — to respect all people, respect differences and not to make people change but just to respect that we’re all different.

“I say that if I ever stop loving what I’m doing I hope I stop — I hope I never do it because I feel as though I have to.”

Mrs Smith said her work was about empowering and encouraging people, particularly in the indigenous community.

“We see too much of people trying to help but they do it in their own (way),” she said.

“They come in with programs and do this and do that, whereas people in Roebourne, they’re aware of what needs to be done but really often just need people to walk alongside and encourage them.”

The Smiths have no plans to leave Roebourne and have fallen in love with the community and the people.

“People are genuine and they really just make you feel part of the community — you’re accepted,” Mrs Smith said.

“I actually told someone recently and I think it’s very true that Roebourne either swallows you or spits you out.

“And I got swallowed, I suppose.”