The Rotary Community Village is a program led by the Rotary Club of Central Melbourne Sunrise Inc with support from Victoria Police, the City of Melbourne, and St. Paul’s Cathedral.

The program addresses anti-social street behaviour in the Melbourne CBD late at night through the presence of Rotary volunteers and the provision of a welcoming place where visitors can take a break, get free refreshments, and maybe wait for transport home. The target demographic includes those groups typically found in the Swanston Street precinct in the early hours of the morning, often young and sometimes under the weather, backpackers and the homeless.  The response is almost always very thankful and surprised that Rotary does this sort of thing.

The hours are a bit tough but the Rotary volunteers who have participated have really enjoyed the spectacle of the CBD at night.

So far the Rotary Community Village has operated on Friday and Saturday nights from 11pm to 4am through December in the run up to Christmas and has been staffed by Central Melbourne Sunrise members.  Our ambition is to open up the program to other clubs and extend the operation to other peak times – the GrandPrix, AFL Grand Final week, and other major events.
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