SINGAPORE: The People's Association (PA) might be revisiting an old goal as its theme for this year — promoting neighbourliness — but it is also looking to the future in ensuring it stays abreast of the changing profile of Singaporeans.

Plans are in place to roll out more small-scale activities to allow residents to interact more meaningfully and build stronger community ties, said PA deputy chairman Lim Boon Heng.

Speaking at the PA's annual workplan seminar on Tuesday, Mr Lim, who is also a Minister in the Prime Minister's Office, said that while events for 10,000 people are important "starting points", there is a need to go beyond organising such big functions.

More could be done to facilitate the formation of interest groups for residents instead, he added. This would require leaders to have new skills, and residents' committees to be restructured in order to support and sustain these groups.

"We are all too busy at work and have many modern day gadgets to keep us in the comfort of our homes," said PA chief executive director Tan Boon Huat. "We're trying to encourage greater interaction so that you get to meet people of different races and socio-economic backgrounds."

An example of a smaller scale and more cohesive activity could be holding pot luck meals after conducting cooking classes to bring residents together even after the course is completed, he suggested.

As part of its renewal efforts, the PA is also embarking on its first recruitment drive in more than 10 years to attract some 4,000 grassroots leaders and volunteers for its 700 various committees islandwide.

The association currently has about 27,000 grassroots leaders and volunteers.

Through this exercise, the PA hopes to recruit more professionals, managers, executives and technicians (PMETs) between the ages of 35 and 55 — a demographic the association said was "under-represented".

PMETs make up nearly 50 per cent of all of the PA's grassroots leaders and volunteers, but with the growing number of graduates and diploma holders in the population, the association hopes to attract a younger demographic to keep up with shifting mindsets and needs.

Other plans the PA might try out this year include clustering the community centres (CC) within several constituencies so as to cut down on repetition of activities.

Mr Tan said: "Feedback from some quarters say that too many CCs and even residents committees offer the same limited set of uninteresting and mediocre events, at a time when the public expects greater variety and increasing quality."


- TODAY/so