Dickie Humphries

Dickie loves HEART, he says it promotes the idea that as a community we have within us the capacity for great compassion in our relationships. Dickie believes there are some narratives out there that emphasise there is something about this community that needs to be fixed. He sees HEART as an alternative to that narrative. That contained in HEART is not the idea that we are flawed, but the idea that there are opportunities to grow deep within us the ability for healthy, loving, true and accepting relationships.

Dickie says his association with HEART is simply an inheritance. Before it was a movement or a funded initiative, all these conversations were happening in the community. The ideas and principles come from all the other work that has happened in the community beforehand.

For him living and working in Tāmaki, particularly Glen Innes, in his 20’s was formative in how he sees the purpose of community development work and how he came to understand the ideas of justice, what is right and what is good. He says HEART views the community with compassion and looks deeply into what is here and what is our potential.

Dickie’s family moved to New Zealand in 1969 from the Cook Islands at a time when countless families across the Pacific where making the courageous exchange of comfort and familiarity for the unsecured promise of a prosperous future. Raised in a single parent household, with the support of State benefits, Dickie counts his upbringing in Mangere, South Auckland as his greatest qualification.

Dickie’s youth work in Tāmaki grew to include community development and community action with particular success in connecting community voices to policy processes. Dickie has worked with Maori and Pasifika communities in Aotearoa, supported the learning needs of young change makers in 98 countries for Oxfam International, contributed to the development of aboriginal youth leadership in Australia, and lived and worked in indigenous rainforest communities in Borneo before returning home to work in youth mental health.

Dickie is the Co-Founding Director of social enterprise Tū Moana and a practitioner with local consulting group Rākau Tautoko. He works with HEART to coordinate our Koru groups, expand the work we do with men, grow the youth voice and help to develop the HEART Leadership programme.