On your brushes, get set, go!

Fourteen RWW managers recently agreed to put their painting talents to the test all in a good cause. One cold weekend in January, they redecorated an empty flat used by the Caritas Refugee and Immigrant Advice Centre in Mülheim. “The idea of doing voluntary work with a team of RWW managers came up at our last meeting,” said Ulrich Schallwig of RWW Communications. As initiator of the Companius project, he was especially pleased with his colleagues’ very positive response: “Within just three days we had our voluntary team of painters in place with managers from all kinds of different areas – technical, business and administrative.”

After that, it was down to work. The walls, ceilings, skirting boards, doors, window frames and radiators of the sixty-square-metre flat were in urgent need of a fresh coat of paint – especially as Caritas is planning to base a new project there. Starting in February, the flat will house a range of professional and voluntary support services for immigrants, refugees and people at risk of homelessness, at the same time promoting greater intercultural harmony. “The idea is to provide hands-on help with integration, for example by offering advice, language and literacy courses for women and help with homework for children and young people,” said Schallwig. “One valuable knock-on effect of this will be to reinforce community involvement in this part of town. The office furniture needed by the centre was provided from RWW’s own stocks,” he added.

The outcome of the weekend’s work is one all those involved can be proud of. Add together 50 litres of wall paint, 7.5 litres of gloss paint and five hours of solid teamwork and what you get is a gleaming white flat ready for its new occupants to move in. Deputy Caritas Director Margret Zerres was delighted: “Our staff won’t recognise the place when they arrive for work on Monday,” she said, thanking everyone profusely. “We’re thrilled with what the RWW people have done for us, especially as they had to sacrifice a whole Saturday and at very short notice, too. We couldn’t have done the necessary renovation work anything like as fast or as thoroughly as they did it.”