Anglican Care Waiapu has been doing excellent work through parishes in the Waiapu region. As keen community contributors who have aimed to support the vulnerable and isolated for the past 180 years, the move to invest with Christian savings was natural.
Earlier this year, we were pleased to have Anglican Care Waiapu invest with us, becoming our 15th shareholder. In doing so, they have joined our mission to serve the churches and Christian charities of New Zealand.
The Anglican Diocese of Waiapu was formed in 1859 to cover a large geographical area across the central and eastern North Island. The area covers the main three regions of Hawke's Bay, Tairāwhiti/Eastland and Bay of Plenty. The Waiapu Anglican Social Services Trust Board, commonly known as Anglican Care Waiapu, was established in 1991 to deliver professional oversight for the social services established by their parishes. The social services offered through parishes include community gardens, providing items for homeless people and providing meals and clothing for seasonal workers.
In 1997 Anglican Care Waiapu Limited was established as the legal entity to own and operate several retirement villages and rest homes. In 2017, Anglican Care Waiapu sold these and began developing an investment strategy that ensures financial stability for existing social services and programmes while seeking partnerships and investment opportunities that allowed them to grow Waiapu’s social impact.
In March 2020, they adopted a mission-aligned investment framework, which allowed them to extend the Diocese of Waiapu’s social impact to better respond to the community's needs.
In doing so, Anglican Care Waiapu decided to invest in Christian Savings; we are incredibly excited to have them join Christian Savings in our mission to grow investments and churches. CEO Lucy Laitinen first became aware of Christian Savings when she was working for World Vision. She says, “the names of Christian Savings and Community Finance popped up early as we [Anglican Care Waiapu] were developing our mission-aligned investment framework and looking at possible investment and partnership opportunities.”
Anglican Care Waiapu went through a rigorous due diligence process and eventually decided to make an equity investment, making Christian Savings their first mission-aligned investment. “Both of our organisations are driven by our Christian beliefs,” Lucy says. The values of Anglican Care Waiapu are Vitality, Integrity, Compassion, and Respect, and they felt that these are also values held by Chirsitian Savings. Anglican Care Waiapu was particularly drawn to the fact that Christian Savings lent to organisations that focused on community initiatives and social housing, which fits into their mission of “Living the gospel through loving service.”
Lucy explains, “Christian Savings is very clear about its identity and purpose. It has a long and successful history of delivery, with significant growth in recent years. Our view is that the team is highly capable, and the organisation is robust with a level of transparency that you perhaps wouldn’t see with traditional investments.’ She has found the staff at Christian Savings to be very relationship-driven. She says, ‘the staff and the Board have invested time into developing a relationship with us and understanding who we are and what makes us tick. They have been open communicators, fun to work with, and definitely full of passion and enthusiasm while still being professional.”
