Reach Out to the Community- CIO

01/01/2025

Wishing all our Staff, Volunteers, Trustees and everyone who has donated to us and continues to support Reach Out to the Community a very Happy New Year 2025.

23/12/2024

If you are concerned about someone experiencing homelessness over the festive period, linked below is a list of centres providing hot food, showers, medical and other support: https://orlo.uk/h5fhZ

22/12/2024

This week we received another fantastic donation from Morrisons for our Foodbank including gift sets for our Christmas Appeal for a local woman’s hostel.
Thank you as always to Morrisons and all their generous customers who donate to their Foodbank collections.

19/12/2024

Huge thanks to Mini Masters Art Club 💚🙏

19/12/2024

WEDNESDAY 18th DECEMBER:

This morning James was out on homeless outreach with Change Grow Live Manchester they covered Chorlton, Northenden, Wythenshawe and Manchester Airport.

19/12/2024

TUESDAY 17th DECEMBER:

This morning Steph started outreach at Manchester Airport starting at 6.30am doing welfare checks and referrals where required.
After the airport the team covered Didsbury and Chorlton.

13/12/2024

Early start this morning, we started at 4.30am and seen 22 people.
The team covered Manchester Airport and areas around Chorlton, Hulme MossSide doing welfare checks and referrals where required.

12/12/2024

Can You support Reach Out to the Community by fundraising for us?

By partnering with ROC helps us to support more people sleeping rough in South Manchester find a new life away from the streets.

Make donations and fundraise for Reach Out To The Community (Roc) with Give as you Live Donate.

11/12/2024

HOMELESSNESS IN SOUTH MANCHESTER:

Our Outreach Team covers homeless outreach in and around South Manchester including Manchester Airport, often starting very early in the morning.
With a large area to cover having a charity van has been a great asset to us.
Many of the people we support are hidden so the team are covering a lot of remote places.
Reach Out to the Community get referrals from concerned members of the public as well as from partners.
Our team will go out ( where it is safe to do so) locate the person and access what support is required and do the appropriate referrals, they will keep visiting the person to ensure they’re getting the right support needed.
The team work in partnership with many partners including Adult Social Care, Change Grow Live Manchester , Manchester City Council Rough Sleepers Support Team, Homeless Mental Health Team and partners from Manchester Homelessness Partnership

We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who supports/ donates too Reach Out to the Community because without you we really couldn’t continue to do the work that we do supporting some of the most vulnerable and at risk people in our community.

Thank you 🙏💚

10/12/2024

TUESDAY 10th DECEMBER:

This morning we started outreach at Manchester AirPort before continuing to look for people sleeping on the streets around Northenden and Chorlton.

10/12/2024

MONDAY 9th DECEMBER:

This morning James joined Manchester City Council Rough Sleepers Support Team on outreach around the City Centre.
We believe it’s important to understand the different aspects of homelessness.
While people are more visible sleeping on the streets in the city centre people are often more hidden in the suburbs where we do our outreach, also working with other outreach teams helps us to gain more experience and knowledge.

08/12/2024

This post came up as a memory and i’m so happy that we can say that on the 3rd day we called an ambulance the social worker with me was amazing and challenged the decision again not to take him to A&E and thankfully they did end up taking him.
In hospital he went through a detox and on discharge was accommodated to a homeless hostel.
His Social Worker, Change Grow Live Manchester support worker and myself continued to offer support.
We managed to sort out his Settled Status and his Universal Credit Claim.
There has been a few bumps along the way it isnt easy coming indoors after so long living on the streets.
At one point we managed to get him into his own supported flat but this became to much for him to handle so he was assisted to terminate the lease and was referred back into a hostel.

Support is ongoing, he still remains in doors and his health has improved.

This is just one example of how well our multiagency partnership works with supporting people with multiple complex issues.

Thank you to all our partners and to everyone who supports the work that we do.
💚🙏

WEDNESDAY 7th DECEMBER:

Sometimes this job can be so difficult, especially when you have no choice but to walk away from a situation where there is a potential risk to life but because the person is deemed to have capacity you literally can’t do anything.

Earlier this year we made a safeguarding referral for an individual that we’ve known for approximately 7 years and in all that time this person has been sleeping on the streets even though many attempts have been made to accommodate this person.

Yesterday we visited them and we decided to call an ambulance as we were concerned for this persons well-being, the ambulance attended and although they wanted to take this person to hospital they had declined and the paramedics made the decision that they had capacity to make the decision so we had to walk away, Jackie from Change Grow Live and I had spent an hour and a half trying to offer accommodation, advice, support, we also provided some harm reduction advice.

Today we’d arranged with their social worker to go and see them, again the social worker called an ambulance as a concern for life because of the extreme cold weather and their poor appearance, this person wasn’t aware of how cold it was.
We were told the ambulance could take upto 9 hours, an hour later GMP attended and again although they agreed this person needed medical assistance lawfully they had no powers to force this person to go to A&E as they had no mental health issues.
The social worker and I spent almost 3 hours there offering accommodation, which was declined and or trying to persuade this person to go to A&E, eventually we had to walk away, which is so difficult under the circumstances but we couldn’t do anything but give them a sleeping bag for warmth.
I’ve called a couple of people and asked them to check on this person tonight and if they see any deterioration then advised them to call an ambulance.
Hopefully the ambulance we called will attend and maybe take them to hospital, fingers crossed.
Myself, Jackie and the social worker will be back out tomorrow morning at 6.30am to do a welfare check.

Not everyone that you see on the streets are unsupported some may have been offered accommodation but for one reason or another are unable or unwilling to accept but that doesn’t mean we ever stop trying to offer accommodation or support them.
Huge thanks to the social worker for everything you did today and all your support.

06/12/2024

Huge thanks to Morrisons in Chorlton and all their customers who support their Foodbank collections for another generous donation towards our Foodbank.
This donation will go towards food parcels to be delivered over the festive season.

Lovely to catch up with Chorlton Park Councillor Dave Rawson today also.

We are still in need of foodbank donations, donations can be dropped off at our Reach Out to the Community Charity Shop
488 Wilbraham Road,
Chorlton.

Open Tuesday - Saturday, 10am-5pm.

https://donate.giveasyoulive.com/charity/reach-out-to-the-community-roc

06/12/2024

WEDNESDAY 5th DECEMBER:

We were joined on outreach at Manchester Airport by the The Chaplaincy Manchester Airport
Steph and David were out doing Welfare checks and referrals into accommodation.

Thank you to The Airport Chaplaincy who have been supporting our homeless outreach for several years, we meet every fortnight to discuss any homelessness issues.

02/12/2024

🙏💚