John barely survived a natural disaster. Now, he is among dozens making a fresh start

Machines are in full spin, washing linen at a commercial laundry on the NSW north coast. Around 30 tons of dirty laundry roll through each week, and that means a lot of ironing for John Hardisty - one of its 70 workers.

“It was actually a very emotional call – I couldn’t believe I had actually found someone that would take me on. I ended up crying on the phone call and I knew that it would change my life and it has and I am so grateful for that.” As an adult, he went on to work for 25 years as a residential youth worker in community housing. During that time, he married and after a long wait, finally became a father.“When my wife passed I really just wanted to run away and hide from the world but I needed somewhere safe to raise my son so that’s when I took on a farm.”But Mr Hardisty’s later move to a camping ground near Mullumbimby, resulted in losing all his possessions when record flooding hit the northern rivers in 2022.

“In the Northern Rivers over the last decade after the drought, the floods and covid, there is a higher number of people who have experienced either losing their jobs, their homes, and kind of community support. So, Beacon offers a safe place for people to land who are ready to get back into the workforce and build their capacity to then transition out into the wider workforce.”

The laundry in the bucolic town of Bangalow is an initiative of White Box Enterprises and was set up at a cost of 12 million dollars. It follows the success of an earlier laundry project in rural Queensland. CEO Luke Terry explains. That’s good news for Mr Terry who is already planning his third project, to create more work for disadvantaged people across Australia.

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