Community Update has awarded Warming Up The Homeless with our Commitment to Excellence Award.
Warming up the Homeless is a registered frontline charity, supporting homeless people on the South East coast, from Hastings to Brighton. The charity has been operating since 2015, acting as a conduit between the raw edge of homelessness and statutory agencies: providing daily outreach support, food banks and welfare advocacy. The rate of homelessness has increased exponentially, exacerbated further by the current cost of living crisis; affecting visible rough sleepers and more invisible homeless, such as sofa surfers and those without a fixed tenancy agreement. We spoke to Trudy Hampton, Chief Executive and Welfare Lead for more details,
“Our services have increased by an astounding 254% – we are seeing many more homeless families, teenagers and adults in dire situations. Our dedicated team of core outreach volunteers go out on the streets every day; supporting the homeless with food parcels, hot drinks, toiletries and offer welfare support. All services are stretched to the hilt but we won’t turn people away in sub-zero, freezing temperatures. We are desperate for food, clothing, toiletries and tent donations, outreach, soup kitchen and food bank volunteers and local business support.”
Warming up the homeless are looking for local businesses to support through any of the following three ways: sponsoring the outreach team, collecting items for the food bank and choosing the charity as the ‘charity of the month’ or year. There are already local schools supporting, such as Bede Secondary School in Eastbourne and restaurants such as Wickham Bistro in Bexhill.
Outreach volunteers will undergo a mandatory training course through East Sussex Council on safeguarding, with an additional in-house professional boundaries course, to fully explore safety aspects. All volunteers support the street homeless as a minimum group of four, providing safety in numbers. Trudy elaborates further,
“Some of the stories are heart-breaking and our volunteers are desperate to help. We train our volunteers to use the proper chains of referral, whilst building up friendly yet professional boundaries. Beyond the immediate frontline food support, we enable people to access longer-term housing support. There are agencies that will assist with maintaining housing tenancies, budgeting and other life skills. Many of these people have experienced adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and are living with trauma. Many have fallen through the safety net. We carry out preventative work in prisons: supporting prisoners with their needs prior to release to reduce re-offending. The work is hard- hitting but we are making a difference every day.”
To find out more about volunteering or sponsoring the charity, see below:
T +44 (0) 7367060708