Monday, January 21, 2013

Two New Stakes in Australia

The Church created two new stakes in Melbourne, Australia over the past two Sundays.

On January 13th, the Melbourne Australia Gippsland Stake was organized from the Melbourne Australia Braeside and Melbourne Australia Narre Warren (formerly Pakenham) Stakes and includes the following five wards and three branches: The Cranbourne, Devon Meadows (Samoan), Lynbrook, Moe, and Pakenham Wards and the Bairnsdale, Sale, and Wonthaggi Branches.

On January 20th, the Melbourne Australia Craigieburne Stake was organized from stakes in western Melbourne.  Information on the names of wards and branches pertaining to the new stake is currently unavailable.  I will post this information as a comment once I receive it.

The organization of two new stakes in Melbourne came as a total shock to me due to the relatively small number of units in the six preexisting stakes.  The creation of the new stakes has coincided with the organization of at least three new wards, thereby providing a sufficient number of wards for all eight stakes.  No additional stakes appear likely to be organized in the Melbourne area for the foreseeable future.  With the creation of two new stakes in the Brisbane area last November, members in Australia speculate that two new stakes may be in the works for the Sydney area considering a couple of the stakes have a sufficient number of wards to divide.

There are now 36 stakes and nine districts in Australia.

9 comments:

  1. Units in the Melbourne Craigieburn Stake include the Seymour Branch, Bendigo Ward, Craigieburn Ward, Glenroy Ward, Greenvale Ward, and Tullamarine Ward (Samoan).

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks. In which case, the Deer Park Stake has lost four of the seven units in the stake and probably had some units move from the Wyndham stake.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Looking at the Sydney area, there are 9 stakes (including Canberra), 3 districts, and a mission branch.

    The 8 non-Canberra stakes have 63 wards and 5 branches. Three additional stakes would still mean an average of 6.2 units per stake in the 8 + 3 = 11 stakes in the Sydney area (higher than in either the Brisbane or Melbourne areas).

    The stakes associated with the Australia Sydney Mission, plus districts and mission branch are:

    Canberra Australia Stake
    Belconnen Ward
    Ginninderra Ward
    Tuggeranong Ward
    Woden Ward
    Merimbula Branch

    Liverpool Australia Stake
    Fairfield 1st Ward
    Fairfield 3rd Ward
    Fairfield 5th Ward (Samoan)
    Green Valley Ward
    Ingleburn 1st Ward
    Ingleburn 2nd Ward (Samoan)
    Liverpool 1st Ward
    Liverpool 2nd Ward (Samoan)
    Liverpool 3rd Ward (Tongan)
    Prairiewood 1st Ward
    Prairiewood 2nd Ward (Spanish)

    Macarthur Australia Stake
    Camden Ward
    Campbelltown 1st Ward
    Campbelltown 2nd Ward (Tongan)
    Campbelltown 3rd Ward (Samoan)
    Campbelltown 4th Ward (Samoan)
    Dapto Ward
    Macarthur Ward
    Minto Ward
    Wollongong Ward
    Mittagong Branch

    Newcastle Australia Stake
    Cessnock Ward
    Charlestown Ward
    Gosford Ward
    Maitland Ward
    Newcastle Ward
    Ourimbah Ward
    Tamworth Ward
    Toronto Ward
    Toukley Ward
    Tuggerah Ward
    Salt Ash Branch
    Taree Branch

    Penrith Australia Stake
    Claremont Meadows Ward
    Emu Plains Ward
    Leura Ward
    Minchinbury Ward
    Penrith Ward
    Richmond Ward

    Sydney Australia Baulkham Hills Stake
    Baulkham Hills Ward
    Dural Ward
    Kellyville 1st Ward
    Kellyville 2nd Ward
    Normanhurst Ward
    Oatlands Ward
    Parramatta Ward
    Winston Hills Ward

    Sydney Australia Harbour Stake
    Harbour YSA Branch
    Ashfield Ward (Mandarin)
    East Lakes Ward (Tongan)
    Greenwich Ward
    Harbord Ward
    Manly Ward
    South Harbour Ward
    Summer Hill Ward

    Sydney Australia Hebersham Stake
    Blacktown Ward
    Doonside Ward
    Hassall Grove Ward
    Mount Druitt Ward
    Oakhurst Ward
    Quakers Hill Ward
    Ropes Crossing Ward

    Sydney Australia Mortdale Stake
    Bankstown 2nd Ward (Samoan)
    Bankstown 1st Ward
    Hurstville Ward
    Mortdale Ward
    Sutherland Ward
    Bankstown 3rd Branch (Cantonese)

    Coffs Harbour Australia District
    Armidale Branch
    Coffs Harbour Branch
    Grafton Branch
    Port Macquarie Branch

    Nowra Australia District
    Narooma Branch
    Nowra Branch
    Ulladulla Branch

    Orange Australia District
    Bathurst Branch
    Cowra Branch
    Dubbo Branch
    Forbes Branch
    Mudgee Branch
    Orange Branch

    Narrabri Branch

    ReplyDelete
  4. The fact that they consolidated one stake in the syndey area because of migration to the suburbs and the fact that they are waiting longer it seems before they create new stake(s), it is quite likely that they may create 2 new stakes in sydney and then one in Newcastle area perhaps a bit later. Newcastle is far away enough from sydney that they could not use sydney stakes to help with the split of Newcastle. I could see one new stake created in the Campbelltown area which is south west of sydney and and one in the blacktown area west of sydney. Then in the north there has been talk of a Central coast (gosford etc)stake and a newcastle stake. I served my mission in the sydney North mission and served a lot in the newcastle area and also in Western sydney. Newcastle has not set any records but has had steady growth in particular in the smaller areas outside newcastle and south west and western sydney has seen really good growth now for many years. We will see I guess

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thanks, A&K, I find that interesting.

    I don't know the sizes of the branches in the districts around the Newcastle Stake, but it seems to me that in a split, the nearest of these branches could be included as well. One of the Newcastle wards--the northernmost, has one district to the east and one to the west and several branches are closer to that ward than the ward is to the stake center.

    The Newcastle Stake has two wards meeting in the stake center in Newcastle, with five wards (3 meeting houses) strung along the coast to the south, and 3 wards and 2 branches to the north--2 wards and 1 branch running east to west just north of Newcastle and then a branch on the coast to the north and then a ward in the interior furthest to the north. Looking at the layout, I think it might be difficult to form two stakes without drawing in branches from the districts flanking that northernmost ward.

    ReplyDelete
  6. The eight stakes in the Melbourne area now have 42 wards and 7 branches:

    Melbourne Australia Braeside Stake
    Frankston Ward
    Moorabbin Ward
    Mornington Ward
    Patterson Lakes Ward
    Springvale Ward

    Melbourne Australia Craigieburn Stake
    Bendigo Ward
    Craigieburn Ward
    Glenroy Ward
    Greenvale Ward
    Tullamarine Ward (Samoan)
    Seymour Branch

    Melbourne Australia Deer Park Stake
    Ballarat Ward
    Brimbank Ward (Tongan)
    Deer Park Ward
    Hillside Ward (new ward)
    Sunbury Ward
    Horsham Branch

    Melbourne Australia Gippsland Stake
    Cranbourne Ward
    Devon Meadows Ward (Samoan)
    Lynbrook Ward
    Moe Ward
    Pakenham Ward
    Bairnsdale Branch
    Sale Branch
    Wonthaggi Branch

    Melbourne Australia Heidelberg Stake
    Caulfield Ward
    Eltham Ward
    Epping Ward
    Fairfield Ward
    Footscray Ward
    Melbourne Branch (Mandarin)

    Melbourne Australia Maroondah Stake
    Croydon Ward
    Doncaster Ward
    Mooroolbark Ward
    Wantirna South Ward
    Wantirna Ward
    Waverley Ward
    Yarra Valley Ward

    Melbourne Australia Narre Warren Stake
    Churchill Park Ward
    Dandenong Ward
    Hallam Ward
    Hampton Park Ward (Samoan)
    Narre Warren Ward

    Melbourne Australia Wyndham Stake
    Geelong Ward
    Melton Ward
    Point Cook Ward
    Tarneit Ward (new ward)
    Werribee Ward
    Warrnambool Branch

    ReplyDelete
  7. Whatever happened to Traralgon Ward? Are they building new stake centres to cope with this growth?

    ReplyDelete
  8. There is also a ward that has just been created at the end of last year in the Melbourne Australia Narre Warren Stake. It’s River Gum Ward.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Also don’t forget the 1 district Melbourne has

    Melbourne Australia Wangaratta District
    Shepparton Branch
    Wangaratta Branch
    Albury Branch
    Wagga Wagga Branch
    Griffith Branch
    Echuca Branch
    Swan Hill Branch
    Finley Branch

    ReplyDelete