News - Page 10 of 31 - Trust for Developing Communities

Volunteer power – A foodbank copes with quadrupling demand

The Vale Community Centre Food Bank is a Craven Vale Community Association project. They experienced a rise from 25 to almost 100 households at peak in lockdown.

To meet this demand, they were supported to move site to the closed Edge Community Centre and merge with the Pankhurst Area. Sim, the lead volunteer, set about upscaling their volunteer recruitment and coordination. Alan, who has been supported with fundraising in the past was encouraged to do some direct fundraising and he was able to secure £20k.

As a small operation they had attempted to meet diverse needs of recipients, including provision for babies or sanitary products as well as activities where possible. They have tried to stay true to this value, which has added to their challenge in upscaling.

Amy, the community worker, has offered advice and support around this balancing of demand and the need to self-care for the 25 strong team of volunteers. Sim has even signed up for peer sessions with TDC community learning to help him establish clear boundaries and continue without overstretching himself. The wellbeing of community volunteers was a cause for concern, and the response by Community Learning to offer peer support was really appreciated.

Amy is now helping the group look at reducing demand as much as possible through ‘moving on’ people to other services where appropriate. This will enable the banks to split back to separate areas and for The Edge to start being used for other community needs. The group will continue to run the food bank until September and are committed to tackling the economic and social injustices which affect people in the area and which have been worsened by Covid-19. They are looking forward to being once more a run-of-the-mill community association, organising fun events and involvement for the residents and providing general help, and maintaining its earlier small food bank facility - but just one day a week, not seven! Hopefully, some of the new, younger volunteers and some of those who have been helping will stay in touch and strengthen the already-impressive sense of local community and pride.

Hollingdean Food Hub

Kirsty Walker, TDC's Director of Neighbourhoods has something to add as we conclude our round up of some of the emergency food provision across the city. "I’d also like to chip in some thanks to the 12 volunteers who helped at our very own TDC hub in Hollingdean, which we ran on behalf of Hollingdean Development Trust (HDT), as they didn’t have the on-site capacity. They let us use their building while closed and we even had a trustee volunteering with us. We helped over 60 households and I am pleased to say that following lockdown we were able to ensure existing local foodbanks will be able to meet our referred demand when we close on 21st August. A couple of volunteers will even continue to collect for people as a result of relationships formed during this process. Meanwhile as with The Edge, HDT will be supported in opening back up."

Community led – a new food hub is formed

The Phoenix Residents’ Group is an organisation dedicated to improving the lives of people in the Phoenix area of Brighton and nearby. As the Covid-19 crisis unfolded, Sarah, Chair and Amy-Lou, secretary, coordinated local action. They brought in local stakeholders like Hyde Housing, the council and the local community forum. It became apparent that the area needed a food hub as it fell between other beneficiary areas and was a pocket of high need. This was a new project for the residents’ group and it now delivers to 30 households each week.

Emma, TDC’s community worker, helped by advising on governance and safeguarding, including operational roles and processes:

Sarah had informal training to develop her online access and proficiency so she could attend emergency food network meetings and learn from peer projects across the city.
Amy Lou was mentored in interviewing skills for managing referral processes.
Another bank’s lead volunteer was brought in to offer advice and peer support on coordinating packing & delivery.

An important aspect not to be lost in all this ‘need’ is the huge value in the community member’s opportunity to ‘give’:

Tina, who is currently shielding, has written a recipe book based on the contents of the food parcels and has helped with researching costings on purchased supplies.
Simon who delivers to the furthest-away properties on a regular basis and has built a good rapport with some very vulnerable service users and acts as a local befriender.

“We couldn't do this without the support of all of our volunteers and have a fantastic network of volunteers from our community who are dedicated to supporting those most in need.”

Sarah, Chair of the Phoenix Residents' Group.

As with Moulsecoomb & Bevendean, the Phoenix group is being networked with local partners to look at more sustainable long-term projects that can mitigate food poverty. For the future, the group hopes to create a community food club or collective of some sort, enabling local people to buy reasonably priced, healthy food.

Resilient community response to lockdown: A foodbank adapts.

As the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown continue to impact some of the most vulnerable in our communities, we are sharing stories about some of the awesome individuals and communities making such a positive difference across Brighton & Hove.

This second collection of hero stories will focus on how our communities and staff have responded to the overwhelming rise in food poverty as lockdown took its toll. Many families and individuals already living in difficult situations have had Covid-19 negatively impact their income as well as their access to essential supplies.

The foodbanks and food access projects we work with serve 1,400 families across the city. Some of the support we have provided during the crisis includes:

developing new referral and supply processes, new risk management and safeguarding protocols
recruiting new volunteers
creating and maintaining hyper-local systems to coordinate essential supplies for vulnerable self-isolators - meal delivery and shopping schemes
working with local grocers and pharmacies, establishing payment methods and safe delivery
supporting community groups to transition to take on vital new activities.
supporting groups to repurpose community buildings into food hubs, storing essentials

TDC works in some of the poorest neighbourhoods in the city and so it was not surprising that many of our community groups found their attention drawn toward making sure the vunerable in their community had food. This was further complicated by many groups relying on older volunteers or volunteers with life limiting conditions who were now having to isolate. So, let’s have a look at what this has meant for community members and staff in the neighbourhoods team.

Resilient community response to lockdown: A foodbank adapts

Moulsecoomb and Bevendean is a large suburb in the North East of Brighton. Multiple generations of families live here and although people face many challenges connected to poverty in the area there is a devoted community of people and organisations working together and looking out for each other.

The Bevendean food bank has been running since 2012 and as well as providing food parcels to those who need it, also offers a coffee morning and advice service where people can discuss financial and health concerns. Entirely run by volunteers, the food bank is open every Wednesday for 48 weeks of the year. In 2019 the group supported 212 people to access food with the largest number being 70 families helped during the week before Christmas.

As lockdown began many of the volunteers had to go home to isolate or shield, and services changed to remote working and the Holy Nativity Hall closed to public access. At the same time demand was rising from an average of 20 to 70+ households per week, many of these large families.

Anke, the TDC community worker:

Liaised with the local authority and the food partnership to ensure the group was following current guidance for this essential activity and being referred to the right service for their household, e.g. referring on to Ageing Well, or Children’s Services for under 5’s.
Made use of local contacts, Brighton volunteer centre and the university to replenish the volunteer team and double it to include delivery drivers.
Linked up with local councillors and other community organisations to help increase supplies.
Supported the remaining volunteer, Mandy, to take on a co-ordination role, risk assessing and planning packing sessions to be as safe & manageable as possible.

You can see some pictures of the Bevendean Food bank volunteers below. As we emerge from lockdown this amazing grassroots activity is now spawning new projects to mitigate long term food poverty through increasing local access to affordable/ low cost healthy food.

Delicious food and positive messages to NHS workers

For the next few weeks, we’ll continue to share uplifting stories about some of the wonderful initiatives and ideas that have come about as community heroes across Brighton & Hove take action to look after one another throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.

As news of the pandemic began to spread and the government took action to lock down the country, we heard about the struggles of overworked NHS staff who weren’t able to access healthy food – a combination of the extra hours they were working and the panic buying that left many supermarket shelves bare.

A recent recruit to our TDC Equalities team, Maha Mustafa works on the Social Prescribing Plus project. Her journey with TDC started when she had support from a Community Development Worker to run groups in the BAME community to bring people together. She then joined us as a volunteer, and earlier this year we were delighted to welcome her on board as a member of staff.

Maha has community spirit running through her and during the Coronavirus pandemic she has shopped for vulnerable people in her community and put together 37 food containers filled with delicious food and all including positive messages for NHS workers.

She has also been able to support an elderly person to learn how to use technology to communicate. With technical support from our digital whizz Cal, Maha was able to able to guide the person in setting up Zoom on the iPad – all done safely as the person stayed inside by the window and Maha stayed outside.

Here are some photos of the food packages Maha sent out, along with positive messages and drawings by her children:

Anna is cooking! – and improving English skills along the way

As highlighted in our post earlier this week, people from minority ethnic backgrounds have been disproportionately affected by the Covid-19 pandemic due to a number of factors and barriers. Our MESH programme addresses the inequality caused by the communication barrier by improving access to language learning opportunities.

Cicely Lloyd works on this programme which we deliver in partnership with Voices in Exile. The Migrant ESOL Support Hub (MESH) works with migrants, refugees and asylum seekers on a one-to-one basis as they integrate themselves into life in Brighton & Hove.

The start of the Covid-19 pandemic saw most of Cicely’s client base stuck at home due to the lockdown. This group of people, some with very limited English skills, were required to stay indoors with their small children, many feeling vulnerable and lonely. The lockdown also meant the sudden loss of their opportunity to practise and improve their English through the adult education college courses they’d been attending as well as through the networks and friends they had made through MESH.

As our MESH case worker, Cicely thought it would be fun to get some of the women together online and quickly set up “Anna is cooking!” – a chance for a local chef to cook for an hour and a half via zoom whilst the women chatted to each other, learning English and cooking skills as they went along. Anna Schwartz of The World Food Project is an experienced facilitator, and has been running “Cook, Eat and Learn English” alongside English teachers for a while. Normally, Anna’s classes take place in a hall and everyone eats what they cook afterwards, so “Anna is cooking!” is an online version during the lockdown. Cicely has been supporting the ladies to get onto zoom and is present at each session to offer language support.

As well as the weekly sessions on zoom, the group has a WhatsApp chat going too so the participants can practice speaking English to each other.

The aim of this new, innovative peer support group is for the participants to be able to support themselves and each other and become more resilient as a group – as well as learning cooking skills and English.

Cicely is also facilitating “EC&EC” (English Conversation & Error Correction), a high-English level group for women to improve their language skills with a focus on current affairs and advanced grammar. You can see a photo of one of these recent sessions below. There will be a Food Safety accredited course taking place for EAL participants this summer too.

Read all the Covid Heroes’ stories →

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Find out more about the support available for people from BAME backgrounds

Overcoming the language barrier for Bangladeshi women

Over the last few months it’s been incredible to witness how the people of Brighton & Hove have adapted to the Covid-19 crisis. The many groups, organisations and individuals we work with across the city were already dealing with significant inequalities which have only intensified as the crisis has unfolded. These community champions are now dealing with additional challenges amidst a vast uncertainty of what is yet to come.

Our city has mobilised to take action and make sure the most vulnerable in our communities are not forgotten. It’s community activity at its finest and at TDC we have not only been impressed by the actions of groups and individuals but incredibly proud of our staff who have adjusted their roles to do what is needed during this unprecedented situation.

We’ll be sharing stories over the next few weeks about some of the amazing community initiatives that have risen out of the Covid-19 crisis and how our team has been able to support those local people taking action. Able to act as a trusted conduit between the communities we work with and statutory services, we have been focusing our pandemic response work on people in poverty and BAME people who are disproportionately affected by Covid-19. Our role is more vital than ever, as we help ensure lifesaving supplies, support and information is provided to the people who need it most, helping them access food and combat isolation and supporting communities to lead the response to this crisis.

This week's stories focus on some of our work with Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic groups across the city. We are currently working with 10 BAME groups, reaching around 700 people. The Social Prescribing Plus, Community Roots and MESH aspects of our work are specifically geared to address the inequalities already experienced by these communities. We also have a short project scoping ways to link communities with services and explore ways they can adapt to meet BAME needs.

Current priorities for us during the pandemic include:

supporting community leaders and volunteers in BAME community groups, helping to keep people connected and well through both online and offline support.
ensuring people have access to accurate UK information.
participating in proactive outreach to overcome known barriers such as language & literacy skills, digital exclusion, uncertainty of rights and lack of knowledge of public sector services.
managing referrals and supporting food banks to supply culturally appropriate food.

Here is the first example of what one of the BAME groups in the city has been doing:

Overcoming the language barrier for Bangladeshi women

It has been identified that some ethnic groups have been disproportionately affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. In terms of health, Public Health England released a report at the start of June entitled “Disparities in the risk and outcomes of COVID-19”.

Regarding ethnicity, the report states that death rates from COVID-19 were highest among people of Black and Asian ethnic groups. Specifically, “an analysis of survival among confirmed COVID-19 cases and using more detailed ethnic groups, shows that after accounting for the effect of sex, age, deprivation and region, people of Bangladeshi ethnicity had around twice the risk of death than people of White British ethnicity”.

Numerous barriers have long meant that people from the Bangladeshi community are less likely to engage with healthcare providers than other ethnic groups, and the pandemic has only acted to increase this legacy in health inequality.

BAME Community Development Worker Sayanti Banerjee works on our Community Roots mental health project and on the Social Prescribing Plus wellbeing project, working 1-to-1 with people to help them improve their own health and wellbeing. Since the Covid-19 crisis began she has been working with Mish, a member of the Moulsecoomb Bangladeshi Women's group who has been volunteering in the community for many years and who has been providing assistance to people throughout the pandemic. One major challenge has been the language barrier, which has restricted people’s access to food and health advice.

Mish has been calling people in the Bengali community to see what help is needed - connecting people to food banks, mosques, and directing people to sources of help for queries around things such as benefits and mental health. She’s also been speaking with people who want to offer help - ensuring their donations and support are directed where it can be best used.

Using her extensive knowledge of local services, Sayanti has been able to work with Mish - linking her up with support and resources; finding relevant information; and connecting Mish to places that can help with benefits, job centre contact info, how to contact the council, etc.

Sayanti’s specialist knowledge through her work as a community development worker and more recently as a social prescribing case worker, has given her a firm understanding of how to navigate a complex system that can sometimes be difficult to understand. Sayanti speaks to Mish every other day on a case-specific basis – and uses these calls to also give support and make sure that Mish is okay herself, reassure her, and make sure she's taking care of her own wellbeing.

This acknowledgement of the disparities coupled with the additional support available to people in the Bangladeshi community, means that people have been able to access help when they need it most. The hope is that this increase in knowledge and skills will ultimately improve the way individuals and families can take care of their own wellbeing beyond the pandemic and far into the future.

Summer activities 2020

Are you aged 11-18 and live in Whitehawk, Bristol Estate, Manor, Woodingdean, Saltdean or Rottingdean?

Join our youth team for some activities this summer. Get in touch with Caroline Vitta 07481 896892 or [email protected] for more details.

A tribute to Barry Hulyer

TDC is very sad to be sharing the news that our founder, friend and community development legend Barry Hulyer died earlier this month.

Barry set up TDC from scratch in 2000, with the aim of sharing values driven, empowering community development work across our city. His creation has gone on to thrive as an impactful charity with neighbourhood community development always at its heart; empowering communities and employing 40 staff to deliver youth work, equalities work and the work in neighbourhoods across the city. Barry touched many lives and was responsible for training hundreds of people – many still working in the sector today.

Barry’s legacy lives on – before TDC, he ran the Hangleton and Knoll Project, was involved in setting up the CVSF (now Community Works), Audio Active and the Resource Centre – all successful and influential charities to this day. A tribute has been made to Barry in the Brighton & Hove News which further details the huge impact he made in the city.

Our condolences go out to Barry’s family and friends. We hope to run a Memorial Event when possible and will keep everyone posted on details as they form.

Solidarity and celebration this Refugee Week

Refugee Week is a UK-wide festival celebrating the contributions, creativity and resilience of refugees, this year it takes place between 15^th and 21^st June. At TDC we are proud to support Brighton’s refugee community and this week we come together with them in celebration and solidarity.

We deliver a range of services to Brighton’s refugees, asylum-seekers, vulnerable migrants, and others of BAMER heritage. Support provided by our MESH (Migrant ESOL Support Hub) and SPP (Social Prescribing Plus) caseworkers throughout the Covid-19 crisis includes well-being check-ins, food bank referrals, digital inclusion provision, free furniture delivery, financial, benefits, housing and health advice and referrals, access to online courses and groups, as well as facilitating our own online ESOL courses, as clients have lost their college based English tuition due to lockdown.

TDC staff are also working alongside the Sussex Syrian Community Group, the Oromo Women’s Group, the Bangladeshi Women’s Group and the Chinese Elders. As we put it in our values – Diversity is our strength.

Here’s a link to B&H Sanctuary-on-Sea’s Refugee Week Virtual Festival Guide, with information about all the events for Refugee Week 2020. Please share it, together with Brighton Refugee Week Facebook events page and @bhrefugeeweek Instagram.

Volunteers’ Week 2020 – Thank you!

The week of June 1st – 7th marks Volunteers’ Week – that time of the year when we give a huge thank you and a big shout out in recognition of the huge impact our amazing volunteers make.

We simply couldn’t do what we do without them, and their contribution has become even more essential during the past few months as the Covid-19 crisis has aggravated the inequalities we already knew existed within our society.

There are too many people to mention. As you would’ve read in Kirsty’s piece on Monday, more than 750 people participated in running activities and services in their communities that we are involved in.

But here are just a few of the people our team wanted to specially thank this week:

“I want to thank Cat for being community minded and a great volunteer in Hollingdean!

Cat is a mum of two lovely teenagers. She loves jewellery and is a maker, she’s caring towards others and loves a chat! She runs jewellery-making courses locally and bead-making workshops at local events both for children and adults. She is also a trustee for the Hollingdean Development Trust and founder member of a new Women’s Mutual Support group!

Thank you!”

Ceza Da Luz, Community Development Worker, Hollingdean & Saunders Park

“I’d love to give a big shout out to say Thank you to all the lovely volunteers who help out on the committee of Friends of Downlands Court, and those who support activities for older people here in Peacehaven. Also, likewise, to all the amazing people who work so hard to run community groups in Woodingdean. It is a pleasure to work with you all.”

Sue Sayers, Project Manager Older People

“THANK YOU Ros & Fran (& husbands and daughter) and Cat, Chrissie, Rob and Gus – without whom we couldn’t have distributed emergency food to 50 households each week across Hollingdean, Bates Estate & Saunders Park. You have all been amazing. You quite literally save my bacon, or at least my eggs & bread every week.”

Kirsty Walker, Director of Neighbourhoods Projects

“So many motivated people support food parcel packing and delivering in the North each week. This week, I want to specifically say thank you to three Brighton Uni student volunteers – Amias, Eliot & Sam – who have been so enthusiastic about packing of food parcels in Moulsecoomb & Bevendean over the weeks!”

Anke Thurm, Community Development Worker Moulsecoomb, Bates Estate & Bevendean

“Thank you to the Albion Community Garden for sharing such happy and colourful photos of the garden on Social Media – it brightens my feed no end.

Thank you to the Phoenix Community Association for immediately rising to the challenge to organise a Food Hub from the Phoenix community Centre.

It has been a delight to work with Amy-Lou Tilley (Secretary for Phoenix CA) and Sarah McCarthy (Chair) as well as Simon (vice Chair) who have worked tirelessly to provide a vital emergency response for their local community and beyond.

I have particularly enjoyed working at the same time on spread sheets with Amy Lou while on speaker phone – feeling we are working together even though we are in different parts of the city.

Tina March also member of the PhCA, thank you for creating a recipe booklet to go with the food parcels – amazing recipes and so quickly put together.”

Emma Reeves, Community Development Worker in Central Brighton

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An appeal has been launched to provide funds for the Food Hubs in central Brighton to ensure that those most vulnerable and affected by this crisis and experiencing hardship through loss of work and income are supported.

And this year, our partners at Community Works have produced a special poster for Volunteers’ Week, for people to colour in and put up in their windows this week. Click here to download your copy of the poster.

Volunteers’ Week 2020 – Maha’s experience

A recent recruit to our TDC Equalities team, Maha Mustafa, is working with us on the Social Prescribing Plus Project. Her journey with TDC started when she had support from a Community Development Worker to run groups in the BME community to bring people together. She then joined us as a volunteer and has now progressed to working within the team.

The picture below shows Maha speaking at the Community Works Equality Symposium, held in February 2018, about the challenges in raising a family between two cultures, the racism she has experienced since she moved to Brighton, and how she motivated herself to learn English and study at the Open University. Plus some of the food packages she prepared for NHS workers when the Covid-19 lockdown first began.

As a colleague of ours said “Maha has community spirit running through her” and as this week is Volunteers’ Week, Maha spoke to Community Works about her experiences.

Here is some more of what she said:

What is your role at TDC?

Social Prescribing Plus Link Worker and Case Worker

What motivated you to become a volunteer at TDC? And how long have you been involved?

I saw that volunteering would give me the ability to understand and connect with others, especially since I have had similar challenges as other BME people living in the UK so I found interest in improving their journeys. Being from different countries, cultures and speaking different languages makes it very hard for women to navigate their way around the system and get support that they may have received from families and friends in their home countries. After navigating the system myself, I feel I am now at an advantage to make other people’s journey easier than mine was. I was volunteering at TDC for six months.

Can you talk me through a typical ‘session’ / give me a bit more information about what you do? Do you have a particular story or anecdote you would like to share about your volunteering experience?

I was volunteering at Trust for the Developing Community for several months; this gave me motivation to continue volunteering and finding out about the help that’s available to ethnic minorities. From my experience as a mother myself, I found it hard to navigate the system and raise my children between two cultures. I know how important it is to keep our identity and how important for our children to embrace it. It is also important to be aware of what the consequences could be on them, the family and the wider community when they begin to lose this connection to their culture.

What is your favourite aspect of the role?

Being able to give people constructive support, advice, guidance and structure. It is a rewarding role that allows me to support others in finding their way and navigating the system.

What benefits do you gain from volunteering?

I would say volunteering allowed me to learn new skills, build my self-esteem and confidence, meet new people from different background with different skills, gain experience and build my confidence to apply for a job.

What would you say to someone who was considering volunteering or helping in their local community?

It brings the community together; it has long standing benefits and you will receive more than you give, it’s an amazing learning experience where everyone benefits.

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Volunteers’ Week 2020 – “We couldn’t exist without them”

By Kirsty Walker, Director of Neighbourhood projects

In February this year, we celebrated some of our fantastic volunteers by giving “Community Champions” awards to inspirational individuals whose hard work giving back to their community makes a huge positive difference to people’s lives.

At practically every TDC AGM (and there’ve been a few now), somebody highlights that our community volunteers are our ‘life blood’ or ‘we couldn’t exist without them’.

This week, as we mark Volunteers’ Week, an annual celebration of the contribution millions of people make across the UK through volunteering, we want to make clear that this is not hyperbole – it is a simple fact in our neighbourhood’s team.

The neighbourhoods we work in are full of community activists helping each other, taking direct action, and even on occasion working with a public service to improve something in their area. It pains me to hear these communities referred to by their needs and deficits when mostly at TDC we just see their amazing passions, skills and strength.

In the year ending March 2020 more than 750 people participated in running activities and services in their communities that we are involved in and they contributed over £290,000 in volunteer hours and other in-kind contributions. They also raised a whopping £140,000 in funding for community projects.

So that’s the big picture stuff, but what does this look like on the ground?

It looks like

amazing individuals sitting up late with account books and receipt bags,
volunteers booking appointments at the resource centre for printing or Grantfinder;
small groups of people spending many an evening sat in cold halls planning projects;
large groups of people inviting out services and companies to discuss local plans;
cooking & eating together,
gardening together,
dancing and exercising together,
even building skate ramps together

and sometimes it looks like just ‘being together’. On high days and holidays, it looks like festivals and street parties. Mostly It LOOKS LIKE A COMMUNITY.

By working together, communities create a resilience, enabling them to face adversity, and this has never been more clearly demonstrated than by the response to the Covid-19 crisis.

Whether mutual aid, unincorporated group, CIC, or registered charity, there have been people at the hard end of the crisis ensuring no one is left behind. Some have been instrumental in making sure that everyone can eat as part of the emergency food network, others have created community oases through their gardening and some have reached out to those isolating though telephone or post.

So on this National Volunteers’ Week 2020 I say THANK YOU. THANK YOU for making this city better for all of us and for letting us be a small part of all the amazing things you do.

+ More

Hollingdean Food Hub

Resilient community response to lockdown: A foodbank adapts

Find out more about the support available for people from BAME backgrounds

Overcoming the language barrier for Bangladeshi women

Find out more about the support available for people from BAME backgrounds

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