South Australia’s Department for Correctional Services has partnered with the private sector to upgrade the outdated facilities – while providing opportunity for prisoners to be trained in construction trades and gain new skills and experience that will help them find employment on release.

The training session brought together the prisoner group along with Correctional Services Operational and Head office staff, Totalspace Design staff and Mossop representatives. All attendees passed the course and a number of the women have indicated their interest in undertaking more training in the area of WHS and site administration.

Bianco’s have been to site measuring up the team for their Personal Protection Equipment, and site sheds are currently being placed in position. Builders Mossop Construction + Interiors, led by Grant Mossop have put together a fantastic team that will be working with our prisoner group to deliver this project. Mark Skinner has been appointed as Project Manager and Scott Charlton as Site foreman. Back at the Mossop’s office, Allan Appadoo is the Contract Administrator, and Peta Marie Matschoss is working on promoting the project to the community and industry groups as well as exploring additional avenues for more training.

The prototype cell has now been completed at the Mossop workshop and is due to be delivered to site shortly, where it will be reviewed and inspected by Operational staff, and then used by the project team as a training tool. Early feedback has been extremely positive and the chance to see everything in place has meant we can iron out any potential issues and verify the design decisions and product choices.

NAWIC South Australia, the National Association for Women In Construction, have come on board as supporters and in the New Year will be hosting a function promoting the project. Thomson Geer Lawyers will also be hosting the Adelaide Plus+ Group – a group of South Australian women who are Leaders in their fields – at a function in February which will be attended by David Brown CEO of SA DCS, and Paul Robinson Director of Asset Services SA DCS. Sarah Paddick of Totalspace Design will be doing a short presentation on the project and its objectives and David and Paul will take questions from the group.

The filming of the documentary on the project is also well underway. Marcella Hayward of Lucky Duck Productions has made a number of visits to SA and is compiling a broad range of footage of the site and interviews with the prisoner group and other members of the project team.

Sarah Paddick of Totalspace Design, will be presenting at the Prison Design and Development Conference being held in Sydney in December, talking about how the project came about, the design philosophy behind the spaces, the method of delivery and the effort to engage the community and garner public support.

Project Team Includes:

Totalspace Design (Architecture, Interiors and Project Management)

Mossop Construction and Interiors (Managing Contractor)

Meinhardt (Building Services and Structural Engineering)