Birmingham Christmas Shelter

Charlotte's Xmas Diary: reflections

2010-03-26T10:58:00.000-07:00

Overall the shelter was nothing how I had expected. The guests were so friendly and so grateful for our help and all the volunteers were amazing. I met some great friends who I am still in contact with now and will hopefully see again next Christmas at the shelter. The shelter hit me quite emotionally and now every time I am moaning that its cold or I am hungry I think about the people on the streets and realise I am very lucky. People are homeless for many different reasons and it is not fair to judge people when you do not know their circumstances.

I was also really happy to see that some of the guests were not homeless but came to the shelter for company and I am glad that we made their Christmas fun and that they were not alone. This Christmas although very very hard work has been my best Christmas yet and has changed my Christmas forever because now I am definitely going to volunteer every year if possible. If anybody said to me that they were thinking of volunteering I would definitely tell them to go for it, it is such a rewarding experience and you will get to meet so many nice people. People volunteer for different reasons some for religion, some for university and some just because they like to help but everyone has the same goal and that is to make the shelter a success. The trustees of the shelter are so inspirational and put so much effort into the shelter.

Charlotte's Xmas Diary: Christmas Eve

2010-03-26T10:52:00.000-07:00

I was a bit nervous walking to the shelter today because it was the first time I would get to meet the guests. When I arrived I signed in and found somebody in a yellow shirt. All the volunteers were given red shirts, the trustees had blue shirts and volunteers who were more experienced and who volunteer every year have yellow shirts and help to run the shelter. The yellow shirt lady told me that everything was in control at the moment and so I should just mingle with the guests and get to know some.

I sat down at a table with two guys in their late twenties. They were very polite to me but a little shy. One of them left after a while to use the computers and the other man started to talk to me a little more. He explained he had moved to England 2 years ago and after his first year his visa had expired and so now he was living on the streets. He was extremely intelligent and every time I saw him later in the day he always had his head stuck in a book.

Then it was time to serve lunch to the guests, I helped to serve the food, which was either a choice of cottage pie or vegetarian pasta bake. The guests loved the food and after we had tidied up the room the volunteers also got to eat. The food was cooked by professional chefs who also volunteer and it was so yummy =)

Next I worked on the coffee bar serving the guests hot drinks, this was very busy. It surprised me at how much they ate straight after lunch! Then I got to sit down and talk to a few more guests. this time the guests I met were not homeless but had come to the shelter because they live on their own and they do not want to be alone at Christmas. They were also very intelligent and one of them came from Algeria so he was helping me with my Arabic! I helped to set up a game of Monopoly for them and then I helped the volunteers to arrange a game of Bingo. The guests loved this and it was their chance to win things such as shower gel and chocolates.

I was sad to leave at 5 because I was having a lot of fun at the shelter and had met some really nice people. It was so nice to see all the things that the shelter was offering to the guests. As well as warmth and hot food, there were showers running all-day, access to the internet, books, a chiropodist, a dentist, a GP, the Samaritans, a barber. There were also people arriving throughout the day to entertain the guests, some children put on a pantomime, a man played the guitar and some girls played the violin and flute.

Charlotte's Xmas Diary: set-up day

2010-03-26T10:49:00.000-07:00

As I am walking to the shelter this morning it is absolutely freezing and I share a thought to the half a million people in Britain who would have been sleeping on the streets or in doorways last night. I get to the shelter early and meet a girl called Suki, we immediately get on and spend most of the morning working together, and it is so nice that everyone is so friendly.

Firstly we moved all the donated food into the kitchen, there is so much that I feel overwhelmed at how generous people are. We then have to check every tin and packet to make sure they are in date. Thus turned into a bit of a game and we were excited when we found the odd thing out of date, some even went back to 2001...oh dear! Then we help to lay out the chairs and tables in the main room where the guests will have entertainment, sandwiches and drinks. Next Suki and I and two more of my new friends are asked to help sort donated clothing into men’s and women’s and take the toiletries to the showers. Everybody is in such a nice happy mood; one man wouldn’t even stop singing!! All of us then help to clean the mattresses ready for the room where the guests will be sleeping and the shelter is starting to look nearly ready now.

I am sad to learn I will not be working with Suki or my other new friends on my other shifts but I am still very excited because everybody is so nice. The shelter opens its doors tomorrow and my next shift is Christmas Eve!!

Charlotte's Xmas Diary: induction

2010-03-26T10:42:00.000-07:00

I was a bit nervous before arriving at the shelter today because I didn’t know what kind of people to expect. After taking a while to find the shelter I arrive and meet two of the trustees who are very nice to me and guide me into a room full of people. They very kindly provided tea and coffee, oh and also biscuits =) as I am pouring a drink a lady comes to talk to me. She explains that she volunteered with the shelter last year and has been made a supervisor this year which she is looking forward to. She is very friendly and gives me lots of tips and advice.

Next we sit down to listen to some of the trustees explain to us our role and what will happen throughout the week. Everybody who works for the shelter is a volunteer from the trustees to the chefs. They explain how there will be lots of different roles from helping to peel the vegetables and prepare the food, serving the food, tidying up, escorting people to the toilets and showers and providing them with entertainment. It all sounds very exciting and I cannot wait to start. All the trustees work very hard and they are all so inspiring. The main message delivered in this meeting was that we are not trying to change the world in a week; however we want to make this week as comfortable as possible for the homeless and other guests, with shelter and food. I was so happy to meet other people, like me who were so willing to help. Everybody was so friendly and I cannot wait to get involved on Tuesday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnuSeIej0ho

Recycling at Birmingham Christmas Shelter 2009

2010-01-10T13:58:00.000-08:00

We have received the following information from our ace-recycler, Ted, at BCS 2009.

"Apparently more consumables were ordered than previously.

Weren't the meals wonderful?! :)

Especially as they were produced by different chefs and volunteers on different days; excepting Roy's consistency and Yvonne's

BUT WHAT GOES IN MUST ...

A maxi-bin was delivered, a number of green wheeled bins arrived (mixed recycling accepted). Paper and card baled or bagged.

Even the most careful management would not prevent some cooked food waste, bound for the maxi-bin.

Mr Phil Brook of Birmingham Waste Department appreciates our project and our management of "waste".

STATISTICS

The maxi-bin - blacks sacks containing cooked food waste; non-recycle-able plastic wrapping; mixed material items e.g. cardboard container with metal base and rim; and the three nasties - black plastic and polystyrene and tetra paks; and grot. Not filled beyond level. Hooray!

10 wheeled bins mixed recycling metal and foil and plastics

2.5 bins separated green, brown, clear glass

3 dozen bales/bags card and paper (and old clothes)

12 half bags of compostable raw food

:( I am still unhappy at so many black sax.

During this year new legislation may appear to regulate container producers :)

My thanks to a few occaisional helpers without whom, etc. I "collapsed" on the 30th as, I expect, did many of you.

WELL DONE ALL.

BEST WISHES JAMIE."

A huge thank you to our volunteers

2010-01-02T08:44:00.001-08:00

This is just a quick note to say thank you to all our amazing volunteers. The Trustees believe that this was a wonderful Shelter, with our new services, especially IT and Samaritans, working really well because of the energy and commitment of our volunteers.

One of our guests left us a letter of thanks that said:

"On behalf of all of us. To Birmingham Christmas Shelter. To all Trustees, Volunteers and Security Staff. On behalf of all the Homeless, Vulnerable, lonely people. We would all like to say a sincere thank you for all your hard work, dedication, patience and kindness for all you have done to make our Christmas a better experience.

"Most of us have had serious problems in our lives and we really do appreciate everything. We would also like to thank those people who have donated food etc. to this charity.

" To Jamie a big thank you from the bottom of our hearts for all your hard work. We wish you the best.

"This is from all of us."

In the next few days we will be uploading some videos to our Youtube channel and we will be blogging about the Shelter. In the meantime, the Lord Mayor of Birmingham, Michael Wilkes, has blogged about his alternative Christmas, including a visit to our Shelter.

Videos of our Christmas Shelter for 2008 are on-line at our Birmingham Christmas Shelter YouTube channel. You can also see some photos from the Lord Mayor's visit on our Birmingham Christmas Shelter Flickr site.

BCS09: open for registration

2009-10-26T14:38:00.000-07:00

We are now open for registration for our inductions. Please see our volunteer letter on our downloads page. You will need to scroll-down - it is called *volunteer letter 2009_2.pdf*
To register please read through the letter and then send us an email clearly detailing the following information:

* Name
* Address
* Contact telephone number (home and / or mobile)
* Email address
* First choice of Induction date
* Second choice of Induction date
* The shifts you would like to work

Inductions will take place on 5th and 12th December at 10am and noon, and on 16th December at 7pm. You must attend an induction if you wish to volunteer.

As per the details in the letter, we receive a huge amount of enquiries between now and Christmas and we would really appreciate it if you direct any queries via our email address, enquiry@openchristmas.org and not via the Trustee mobile. Emails are checked daily and we will always respond to you.

We are very excited about Christmas 2009 and we could not do it without your support and commitment - we really look forward to seeing you at your induction and of course at the Shelter this year.

Please remember to bring a piece of photographic ID to your induction as we will be asking you to check the details we hold on our database. Once you know which induction you are attending (we will confirm this to you), please remember to allow plenty of time to sign in so that inductions can start promptly.

Broadening our understanding of our community

2009-10-04T06:39:00.000-07:00

We had a great meeting yesterday at St Georges - almost a full-house, and the Trustees are really grateful to our wonderful Area Supervisors for their commitment to BCS. The meeting discussed some big issues, namely: the extra services and space we would have this Christmas, including Samaritans, Citizens Advice, Housing Advice, Library Services and IT skills; the provision of clothing at the Shelter for our guests; and the impact of the recession on our numbers this year - we need to enter into discussion with our friends around Birmingham to see the impact on their services this year.

We also had a great discussion with Philippe from Phoenix Futures about drugs awareness and the impact of classified and declassified drugs on our guests. Given that drug dependency, from alcohol and nicotine, to heroin, crack cocaine and methadone does impact our guests this was a critical session. Philippe handled our individual and collective (mis)conceptions really well, and enabled us to engage with the related psychological and mental health issues.

It will be interesting to see how this affects our behaviours over Christmas and our ability to relate to our guests.

Street Collection for BCS, and a note on fundraising

2009-09-13T04:57:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we held our second street collection around the City Centre. Jamie had arranged everything with the Council and after he came down with Swine Flu, Ali organised our logistics on the day. However, alongside these two, a big thank you also goes to Roy for all his help in bagging and counting up the cash, and to Jo for staying to the end with him to help out!

Overall 25 volunteers went out to collect in locations from the Hippodrome to Snow Hill Station. We had 17 volunteers collect in the morning and 8 in the afternoon, and we are really grateful for our friends' energy and commitment. Although this was fewer volunteers than last year in all we collected £811.44 and this will make a real difference to our work at Christmas.

Our notable collector of the day was our new Trustee, Steve Johal, who raised £119.99. Great stuff!

One extra point-of-note is that our Fundraising Committee has this year worked so hard to exceed last year's total. We have been rewarded with two very positive responses, from Npower and Cadburys, and three more charitable trusts are considering our application to them for help.

Our "rainy" Dog walk was again a success, raising £631 to date. Zurich Insurance has also made another valued contribution this year.

Forthcoming events include Peter Brownjohn's "flower celebration" and Medini Richardson's "Bag packing". Lynne has done a fantastic job as Fundraising Committee Chair in raising valued funding for BCS and contributed to the largest single donation of £7000 in BCS history.

With Richard Hall's Lyke Wake Walk contribution, we have raised almost £11,000, before donations.

This is an amazing effort and we are so grateful for everyone's efforts.

Roll on Christmas.

Lyke Wake Walk for BCS

2009-08-05T12:29:00.000-07:00

Steve and Richard managed to raise £950 on their epic 40 mile walk across the North Yorks Moors. You can view the video on the BCS YouTube site.

Dog walk for BCS: July 2009

2009-08-05T12:05:00.000-07:00

A very big thank you to Lynne Murray and Neil Foster for organising our annual sponsored dog walk in July 09. Despite a very rainy start, our dedicated dog walkers were keen to get going along the Rea Valley! From Terrier to Alsation, the dogs had a great time running around Cannon Hill and playing in the river - the walkers had fun too! Thank you very much to everyone who came along and supported the event.

You can check out some photos on our BCS Flickr feed

Lyke Wake Walk for BCS

2009-05-26T08:53:00.000-07:00

On Saturday 20 June 2009, Richard Hall [BCS Trustee] and Steve Chaplin [mountain goat] will be attempting the Lyke Wake Walk across 40-ish miles of the North York Moors from Osmotherley to the sea at Ravenscar. The walk has to be completed within 24 hours and will most likely require a 4am start at Osmotherley. Oh dear.

The route is liable to be extremely boggy and in the event of more extreme weather we'll probably defer the walk until the Sunday or Monday. However, the walk will be done!!

In order to make this apparent 15-hours of lunacy more worthwhile, we intend to walk the walk to raise funds for Birmingham Christmas Shelter, in particular to pay for Christmas gift bags for our guests and for provisions for this year's Christmas lunch.

So if you would like to sponsor us that would be wonderful. To do so, please:

click through to the Birmingham Christmas Shelter secure on-line account;
click on the make payment link; and
in the "donation details" page, please use the text-box "Please pass the following instructions to the charity" to type that your donation is for our "Lyke Wake walk". This means that we will be able to track how much is raised by Steve and Richard.

Please also leave a comment here for us, under this blog entry, with any advice, guidance, messages of support, and a note of how much you have sponsored us for [so we can keep a tally]. Simply click on the "comment" link to the right of where it states "Posted by Richard Hall".

We will make a BCS YouTube video of the walk - so if you want to see me having a beer at The Lion at Blakey Ridge [around noon on Saturday], or crawling to the sea at Ravenscar [around 10pm on Saturday], you'll have to wait for that video.

Thanks for reading and for your on-going support for Birmingham Christmas Shelter. This walk is part of our fundraising committee's attempts to enhance what we do for our guests at Christmas. Your support is invaluable and hugely appreciated.

Next BCS Volunteer Get-Together

2009-05-06T00:02:00.000-07:00

Our very own dynamic Area Supervisor, DJ Phil, has been busy testing all the bars, clubs and restaurants in Birmingham city centre and has decided that 'The Green Room' cafe-bar is worthy of our patronage for the next BCS Volunteer get-together. It is in the Arcadian centre, close to where we first met in January and February and is directly opposite the Hippodrome Theatre.

We will be there from 17:00hrs on Sunday 10th May '09 and all BCS Volunteers are welcome. As always, no need to confirm, just turn-up, with or without friends and/or family - all are welcome. In the meantime, please give a little thought to what you would like us to organise for forthcoming evenings - salsa dancing is still on-the-cards, as is 'flower-arranging the DJ Phil way'.

As always, DJ Phil and Ellis P are always happy to field any questions etc..

Dave Morris rows the London Marathon for BCS

2009-03-31T07:13:00.000-07:00

On April 26^th at 10:00am, when the London Marathon starts, our friend and Birmingham Christmas Shelter donor Dave Morris will start rowing on a Concept2 indoor rowing machine at the Virgin Active gym in Solihull. He is aiming to complete the full 26 mile distance (or 42195 meters for the Europeans among us) in under 3 and a half hours.

He has been training for over 20 weeks and has covered over 800,000 meters in training including several half marathons and one row of 20 miles. He is carrying an injured arm ("my own" says Dave) which will need surgery 10 days after the event!

Funds raised will be split as follows; 50% BCS, 25% Welsh Air Ambulance, 25% Cancer Research.

All pledges of donations should be emailed to Dave at Morris301@btinternet.com

Crisis planning £2.5m centre for Birmingham homeless

2009-03-23T13:59:00.000-07:00

Mike, Jamie and Ali attended a reception hosted by Crisis and SIFA fireside on 12 March at the Rep. The two organisations were flagging the fact that Crisis is planning a £2.5m centre for Birmingham's homeless and this is due to open in 18 months.

As far as we are aware there is no plan to open a Christmas Shelter and so our work will continue. However, we do plan to monitor this situation and to work more closely with partner organisations in Birmingham. At the very least we hope that we can engage our guests with more skills and outreach-related developments, as appropriate.

Birmingham Christmas Shelter on Twitter

2009-03-08T15:07:00.000-07:00

It's nice to see Birmingham Christmas Shelter now on Twitter. Follow us at BrumXmasShelter. We'll use this to publicise our plans and the shelter during 2009.

BCS, SIFA Fireside and Crisis

2009-02-23T03:30:00.000-08:00

The Trustees of Birmingham Christmas Shelter have been invited to a reception about a proposed partnership between SIFA Fireside and Crisis, under the banner of Skylight Birmingham. We hope that the reception will lead to a dialogue about the provision of homeless services, year-round, in Birmingham.

One of our main aims for 2009 is to extend our co-operation and engagement with outreach organisations, in order to offer better experiences for our guests at Christmas, and also to engage the vast expertise of our networks of volunteers. We believe that through partnerships with local and national organisations, like SIFA Fireside and Crisis, we can capitalise on the community spirit of our volunteers and guests and do better things.

We'll let you know how we get on.

Recycling at Christmas

2009-01-07T02:48:00.001-08:00

Over the years a target for BCS has been to reduce the amount of waste that we produce during Christmas week. Ted, our top recycler, speaks about this in our first YouTube video.

This year we used one medium skip, and managed to recycle:

30 bundles of paper/card;
10 bags of cleaned and crushed metals;
10 bas of plastics [it is frustrating that many plastics, especially those that are black, are not accepted];
3 bags of glass;
1 bag of crushed foil; and
4 bags of compostables.

As ever, tetrapacks caused Ted some distress as they cannot be recycled. Maybe next year, huh?

Christmas Shelter 2008

2009-01-06T06:56:00.000-08:00

We had a great Christmas Shelter last year. Some of the highlights can be seen on our Birmingham Christmas Shelter YouTube channel.

Some headlines follow.

1. We had the following number of guests eat or sleep over with us each day.

	Breakfast	Lunch	Dinner	Male sleep	Female sleep
23^rd		45	66	41	2
24^th	46	60	90	80	5
25^th	90	145	110	97	6
26^th	93	99	98	80	5
27^th	85	110	102	86	7
28^th	105

2. We had the following number of guests use our services

Service	No. of guests that used service
Showers	92
Manicurist	16
Hairdresser	15
Citezens Advice	7
Chiropodist	23

3. We had some good media coverage locally and nationally, and Liam Byrne, Cabinet Office Minister, made an announcement about volunteering whilst he visted us on 27/12/08.

The Trustees of BCS would like to say a huge thank you to all our volunteers and service-providers who made this such a wonderful Christmas experience.

Christmas 2008

2008-10-19T09:54:00.000-07:00

We have updated our website with details of our Christmas induction times for 2008. We have also added in the shifts for volunteers. If you have any questions then please email enquiry@openchristmas.org

Charity Dog Walk

2008-09-22T01:18:00.000-07:00

Lynne Murray organised a sponsored dog walk for BCS back in July. We've managedto locate a few fotos thanks to Neil Foster...

Image 1: Mike, Jamie, Lynne and friends waiting for the off

Image 2: confusion reigns

Image 3: patience

Street Collection: fotos

2008-09-15T13:01:00.000-07:00

A couple of fotos of from Ali R have winged their way to me. Look how pleased our glorious leader is with himself!! And so he should be after all his sterling work!!

Image 1: Jamie in Carrs Lane

Image 2: collection tin

Street Collection: Saturday 13 September

2008-09-14T09:17:00.000-07:00

Yesterday 34 of us were involved in a street collection around Birmingham City Centre. We raised over £1,000 and are so grateful to everyone who volunteered for a 3 hour shift. Thankfully the weather was fine. The Trustees would also like to thank Carrs Lane Church for their logistical support, and for those who were involved in managing the collection process and keeping tired spirits high.

It was also really great to see volunteers and friends whom we hadn't seen since last Christmas. The number of Volunteers who came along was excellent and it really helps the Trustees to know that so many people are able to help us out at key times throughout the year.

Walk a mile

2008-08-18T06:14:00.000-07:00

We decided that July would be "Walk a Mile Month" for BCS, and encouraged all our volunteers to organise walks with friends, colleagues, workmates. We hoped for a minimum donation of a quid per person walking.

I organised a walk at De Montfort University at the start of the month and raised £100.

Special congratulations are due to Lynne Murray who raised £128.50 with her dog ‘walk a mile’! Special thanks are also due to Neil Foster, who produced the sponsor forms and posters. Lynne also presented a cheque to our Chair, Jamie for £500 from the Zurich Community Trust. Lynne had approached them and told them about BCS. This was a fantastic donation. Well done Lynne!

Woodgate Valley Open Day

2008-06-12T04:03:00.000-07:00

So Mike, Ali, Lynda, Lynne and I had a great time at Woodgate last Sunday. The weather was glorious, our new banner was unfurled and the business cards were unleashed. More importantly, 190 balloons were filled with helium (mainly by Mike!) and released by the variety of interested families and individuals. Each balloon had business cards and names attached to them (by Lynda and Lynne), and Ali managed the administration of it all magnificently. I am unsure quite what I contributed other than sunscreen and going on tea runs.

We raised £125.14, which was a great total, and we are so grateful for all of the voluntary contributions. This was a great test for the ideas raised by the new fundraising committee. Moreover, the day went really well for Woodgate Farm and we really feel we are building a good relationship with this excellent, a voluntary organisation (based on Alan's hard work).

Our next fund raising event will be our "Walk a mile" initiative in July. Watch this space!!

Woodgate Valley Urban Farm

2008-05-28T07:48:00.000-07:00

We have a stall at Woodgate Valley Urban Farm Open Day on Sunday 8 June from 11 - 4. You should be able to spot us in our blue, yellow and red BCS T-shirts blowing up balloons and looking cheery. If you are there it would be great to chat to you, so pop over.

It will be the first outing for our new banner/business cards, as we move towards a more professional approach to volunteering. Looking forward to seeing you there - the weather will be good so pack your suntan lotion...

Minutes of the Trustees' Meeting of 10 May, 2008

2008-05-25T08:42:00.000-07:00

Apologies for the late upload of these minutes... You just can't get the volunteers you know...

Mike, Richard, Ali and Jamie attended, although Ali had to leave early, and Pol/Russ gave their apologies.

Matters arising

In terms of matters arising from previous meetings we have contacted those great businesses who supported us last Christmas: Aubrey Allen; and Merrychef. Mike has also contacted the local Mosque to thank them.

Richard needs to transfer and sort the website, domain details, databases etc..

Jamie has brought the excellent Christmas card hand-painting to St George’s. We will be producing Christmas Cards based on this design and will house it at St George's as a celebration of time and support.

All our Charity Commission documentation is completed, registered & stored on our Google archives.

Woodgate Valley Urban Farm Open Day

Mike has contacted Woodgate Valley Urban Farm about our stall on Sunday 8 June. We are really pleased to have this opportunity to work with Woodgate at their open day. Ali has ordered some balloons and helium, and Richard has ordered some advertising materials. Mike is pretty effusive about the lie-of-the-land and what the Farm has to offer us.

Security

Jamie and Ali will be speaking to recruitment agencies, and investigating a possibility or two that Ali has found.

Trustees

Russell England resigned with immediate effect. Pol has forwarded a thank you letter to Russ on behalf of the Trustee and charity.

Ali has been formally welcomed to the board.

Strapline

For the time being we have decided to use the strapline, "Where will you spend Christmas?"

Fundraising

Linda G has forwarded bullet points for an e-mail letter about our proposed “Walk a mile for the homeless” in July. Pol will formulate and distribute to all active Vol’s by e-mail or post.

There is a Street collection in Birmingham city centre on Sat 13^th Sept 08. Our application has been received by council, and we are awaiting outcome. Sticker flags maybe used, and each donor will be given a business card. We thank that up to 50 volunteers may be needed on 2 shifts. We will be operating from 10am – 5pm. Active volunteers will be contacted by e-mail letter or post. If you are interested let us know.

Lynn M suggested that her daughter could advise the Fundraising committee as she has experience with similar organisations and fundraising. We are happy to accept these kind offers of support, so let us know what other skills you have.

We are considering BCS charity tins to be placed in local shops/businesses which sponsor and support BCS. We are also considering which local businesses to promote and advertise on our website

Potential Area Supervisors

All potential new Area Supervisors have been contacted, and we are really pleased with the quality and commitment of our new supervisors.

It was agreed on receiving 2 satisfactory references new A/S would be contacted by phone, informed their application had been successful but they still have the option of a 121 interview with a trustee.

Next meetings

There will be a joint Trustee and Area Supervisors Meeting Sat 5th July 08

The next Trustee’s Meeting is on Sat 7^th June 08

Fundraising: Part 2

2008-05-09T07:28:00.000-07:00

There was a second meeting of the Fundraising Committee, held in Moseley, on Wednesday evening.

In Attendance were Jamie, Ali and Lynda, with apologies from me, Mike, Sandra, Karen and Lynn.

Action Points and whether or not they are Implemented (I) or On-going (O/g) are noted below. There are a lot of possibilities and a lot of activity.

Richard:
1. Facebook Group and Blog set-up: I
2. Tag registered on YouTube, BCS: I
3. Group e-mail link for Fundraising Committee: O/g
4. Poster, Printing, setting & business cards: Trustees will discuss this on Saturday.
5. Youtube videos: o/g
6. Contact to be made with local football club supporters' trusts: o/g

Jamie:
1. Street collection application and confirmation received from City council: o/g
2. Circular, letter, leaflet for BCS promotion to local organisations: o/g
3. Local charity Patrons to be contacted: O/g

Mike:
2. Woodgate valley: Not prudent to give gifts, suggest balloons, approx 200 visitors. Action: Balloons, helium, business cards and £10-£25 winning voucher to be purchased.

Lynda:
1. 1 mile sponsored walk: e-mail circular to active volunteers: o/g
2. Contact small local business, restaurant, hairdresser etc to advertise on BCS web site: o/g
3. Disco Lads: arranging meet O/g

New Trustee

2008-05-06T09:11:00.000-07:00

Jamie, Mike and Richard met Ali R on Saturday over orange juice and toast, to discuss her becoming a new Trustee for BCS. The damage that Jamie and Mike are doing to their respective arteries is shown below.

However, the big news is that having taken up references and gone though a preliminary and final interview Ali is now a Trustee. We are really pleased about this because it is the diversity and unity of the Trustees that help give the Charity its vision and momentum, as well as its structure. Moreover, we need to spread the workload in a sustainable manner.

Again, much of our discussion covered fundraising, security during Christmas week and enhancing our overall impact and effectiveness. On the first of these points the fund-raising committee meets tomorrow night.

p.s. don't forget to join the Facebook group.

Our glorious leader:

Mike concentrates:

Fundraising sub-committee

2008-04-20T11:23:00.000-07:00

We held a Trustee & Volunteer fundraising meeting on Saturday @ St Georges Post-16 centre. In attendance were Jamie Reynolds, Richard Hall, Mike Davey, Lynda Gibbon, Lynn Murray, Sandra Ward and Karen Everett, with apologies from Pol Davey.

So, the Trustees are pretty driven by the need to extend our fundraising beyond donations [which we still need and greatly appreciate!!!]. We were really pleased that a new fundraising committee has been formed to ensure the future financial security of the charity and to raise its profile. All those who attended have agreed to take an active roll and Jamie has agreed to coordinate.

We agreed to investigate the following points around fundraising and awareness-raising.

Birmingham City Centre Street collection for Saturday 13th Sept 2008. If you are interested email volunteer@openchristmas.org.
Leaflet promotion, to local organisations e.g., Churches, mosques, Temples, Synagogues, Masons, Lions, Co-op, Golf clubs, Schools, Universities, Football clubs, Birmingham Bullets and Moseley Rugby Club.
To look for active patrons for BCS.
To investigate local industrial links, alongside community centres and libraries.
To work up a plan for local, devolved and sponsored events, that can be held at the same time rather than in the same space.
To attend the Woodgate Valley Urban Park Open Day on Sunday 8 June @ 11am. Come and meet us there!!
To evaluate how Facebook, YouTube and Blogs might be used. You can join our Facebook BCS group.

We are so grateful to all who attended today, its was very motivating. The new board of Trustee's are very grateful for your time, commitment and energy!!!

Our next Meeting will be 7.30pm on Wed 7th May 2008, Venue to be arranged.