The Otara Scorpions hosted a Gala Day for their club which featured 23 home games across the grades, partners setting up information stations, along with plenty of activities for whānau to get involved with.

It marked the launch of the ‘Scorpions Digital Preservation Project’ with Auckland Libraries. The project aims to digitalise pieces from the history of the Otara club and store them within the Auckland Library system.

“The team wanted to collaborate with us to protect these stories and the heritage collections.” Nia Vavao, Pasefika Specialist at Waitakere Central Library, said when discussing how the partnership with the Scorpions came about. “They might just get lost in someone’s garage, they will forget about it, then 30 years later, they look back and the photos might be ruined, so we are trying to help prevent that.”

Team Khan from Mike Pero are proud supporters of the Ōtara Scorpions and were there to support the day and provide information to the community.

“Finance and mortgages are an area that not a lot of people are familiar with”, Vanesa Oliver said. “I’d like to think that having some sort of visibility gives people the opportunity to approach us, to talk through anything they’ve been thinking about around mortgages, insurance and finance.”

“Mike Pero’s Team Khan, South Seas Healthcare, Census, Smoke Free, all these people come in and are part of the community and what they provide helps the community”, Willie Maea said. “We don’t want to just be a sports club that looks after people on the field. The game is a lot bigger than that, and that’s why we help people off the field.”

The Otara committee team have been working to pull together this Gala Day. “We’ve been planning this Gala Day since the beginning of the year and it just allows us to acknowledge the people that are supporting us”, Willie said.

The day wasn’t just a great success off the field, but on the field too, with both Premier grades and the Premier Reserves securing wins at home.

With it not too late to fill out the census, they were involved on the day, and you can find out more about here: https://www.census.govt.nz/