Kindness Homeless Street Team
2
The Pitch
Problem statement
We address poverty and homelessness in Glasgow and the surrounding area. We have a soup kitchen and feed over 300 people each week. We supply clothes, toiletries, help and advice, offer recovery programmes, hold well being drop in and physical activities like boxing and keep fig to help with mental health. We rehome people into permanent or temp accommodation by supplying all furniture, home furnishings, carpets etc. We try and offer a safe place to help people choose different paths, help with job applications, interview prep and support people by giving them a purpose.
Solution
To allow us to reach out to more people as our queues are getting longer due to the current economic climate, we have children queuing for food and support too. We want to continue to help our people of glasgow but as they need to queue in George Square in all weather our next goal is to acquire an inside community space so we can open a recovery cafe so we can feed people inside from the elements. We will continue to offer well-being help, fitness and just add onto what we currently provide.
Why are we best placed to deliver?
We have been succeeding since starting it up from handing out sandwiches from the boot of our car to now feeding more than 300 people each week hot food. Over and above that we hand out food parcels, clothes, furniture and give our ongoing support and offer a sense of community and kindness to our street friends. We have grown into a charity that supports our volunteers (we now have approx 80 regular volunteers) where 2/3rds have been in recovery of been homeless so we are giving them a safe place to now give back and help out but also provide them a sense of purpose, being part of a team and a support network. Our soup kitchen provided a safe place to socialise, eat and get support.
Focus Areas
Delivery plan
Budget breakdown
| To continue feeding our service users for the next few months | £1,000 |
| To put towards looking for a community center to feed our service users in a warm, dry environment | £1,000 |
Beneficiaries
300 people
Expected impact
There will be a direct impact and a longer term goal too. Directly some of the funding will go straight out to buy food and provisions for our vulnerable and homeless service users. Our queues are getting longer and it will only get worse due to the current economic climate so we need as much help via funding that we can get to allow us to continue to help as many people as possible. We also help reintroduce our service users into society by choosing a different pathway with providing an amazing support network. Around 2/3rds of our volunteers are in recovery or been homeless so our service is a life line to many, many people. Going forward our longer term goal is to use funding to help us open up a community space where we can offer food in a sheltered environment where people are protected from the elements of adverse weather. We also offer well-being evenings, fitness classes and chats to help improve people’s overall mental health.
Track record
We have been running our soup kitchen and food bank since Oct 2019 and it has grown significantly. Projects we have offered to our service users include our first Recovery walk, Birthday support for many underprivileged families Many families fully supported for Christmas dinner & gifts 75 children came to see Santa on 12/12/21 by visiting our ToyTown receiving gifts, food, drinks and an amazing social event, also gave the families a photo visiting Santa that they otherwise couldn’t afford 77 children fully clothed to go back to school Hairdressing/barbers for kids to go back to school Soup kitchen fed over 300 people per week since December 2020 and 7800 food parcels offered. 8 families enjoyed a caravan break fully paid including travel costs and spending money last summer and again this summer, Nursery supplied with Christmas packs Sponsored 2 football teams strips Many furniture referrals per week covering 364 properties since January to help furnish houses.