Tangentyere Council


Tangentyere Council is a major service delivery agency in Alice Springs which offers a wide range of services and programs for Aboriginal people in Central Australia.
Tangentyere Council was originally created around tenure, services and essential services for Town Camps, and their residents, in the 1970s but quickly developed to incorporate family, community and social services.

Background

Town camps, initially established on the fringe of Alice Springs, have long being a feature of the town. They are the direct result of the dispossession of Aboriginal people from their traditional lands and there is a strong history of opposition to them. Despite this opposition the camps survived, avoiding measures to remove or assimilate them, and from the 1970s have campaigned to actively assert their rights; demanding land tenure, shelter, services and self-determination. In order to do this Tangentyere Council, was established; tangentyere is a derivative of tunkatjira an Arrernte word meaning all speaking together and it aimed to unite Aboriginal people in Central Australia from all of the language and people groups including, but not limited to, Warlpiri, Anmatyerre, Kaytetye, Pitjantjatjara, Luritja, Alyawarre and Pintupi.
Tangentyere Council was initially established in 1974, referred to as Tunkatjira, and it was officially recognised in 1977 before finally being incorporated as Tangentyere Council on 6 February 1979. It is unknown why the spelling was changed at this time.
Despite significant steps forward is housing services to town camps, from humpies and bits of tins to houses the living standards of their residents remain unacceptably low and, it is partially for this reason, that Tangentyere Council now offers a wide range of social services and runs not-for-profit enterprises:
Services:
Enterprises:
Tangentyere Council employs more than 200 staff, of which approximately 70% are aboriginal.