A significant aspect of the preceding two years had been the story of how the Harpenden Trust responded in such a magnificent way to the global pandemic, as over 500 local people stepped forward to support the Harpenden community. The last 12 months have been no less important as circumstances change, from the horrific war in the Ukraine to the growing cost of living crisis: we continue to experience growing local needs and challenges.
Our purpose
We remain focused on our core purpose, supporting our local community.
For over 70 years, the Harpenden Trust has sought to be a source of local support for anyone across our Harpenden community who needs help – whatever their age, whatever their background. So often, a small amount of local practical support can make such a big difference. The simple underlying principle behind the Trust is being that good neighbour. To local people, the Trust offers that degree of readily accessible, practical support – either accessing our range of core services and activities, or by the Trust signposting people towards relevant local expertise where they can find the support or advice they need.
Rising to local challenges
Our Care Fund and our Community Fund both continue to support individuals and local organisations in many ways.
The Care Fund, with the support of so many volunteers and the financial resources generated from the annual Christmas Appeal, and supplemented by generous legacies over many years, continues to operate its programme of Home Visits offering support to those who seek help. This is alongside the increasingly popular Tuesday and Thursday weekly Tea and Coffee mornings; the regular Seniors’ Outings; the various organised Family Outings; the Christmas Parcels delivered to 151 residents generating a little additional Christmas cheer; the grants for those in most financial need to assist with utilities payments or for educational expenses; and the transportation to events. The Care Fund has experienced an ever-increasing number of attendees given the growing awareness of everything the Trust does.
Our more recent Wellbeing initiative has continued to develop at some considerable pace. The partnership with our three local GP surgeries and Mind in Mid Herts, which was the genesis of the “Harpenden Wellbeing Hub” initiative, is now increasingly visible across the town: from the Frazzled Café (providing a safe confidential and non-judgemental environment for people who are feeling frazzled or overwhelmed with the stresses of modern life) - to the Memory Lane Café (welcoming people with dementia and a family member, friend or carer every Monday afternoon) - to the Arts on Prescription programme (as increasing evidence emerges that the arts have an important contribution to make to health and wellbeing) - to coaching sessions to help individuals move their lives forward. These are just four of the increasingly varied and growing initiatives we have put in place. Our long-standing Befriending service, offering companionship to anyone who seeks it, also continues to grow and thrive, now reaching around 100 local residents.
The Community Fund continues to access the financial reserves built up since 2008 following the endowment the Trust received from Abbeyfield. Alongside many local projects and support for local charities, the Community Fund’s contribution to facilities at various local Harpenden schools over the last year has been a highly visible sign of the Community Fund’s continued great work and contribution to the local community.
Our focus in the last twelve months on ensuring our support reaches some of our younger residents across the local community has included funding and supporting the Stormbreak initiative to improve child mental health, which has now been rolled out across 8 primary schools in Harpenden. We are equally delighted to be working in partnership with Youth Talk, the St Albans based free and confidential counselling service for 13 to 25 year olds, to establish a presence in Harpenden by launching a new pilot to provide group counselling services.
This last year we have also responded to some other very specific needs. We are now working in partnership with the Harpenden Library to provide volunteers to keep the Library service open on Wednesday afternoons. Libraries are often at the heart of local communities - a warm space where anyone can go to read, borrow, learn, access information or get online. We have continued to offer assistance to Ukrainian refugees housed across the Harpenden area. And, of course, Vaccination Centre support also continued this last year in support of our GPs surgeries, with Covid and flu vaccination rollout programmes at various times.
Determined to do more
Behind the purple doors at No.90 Southdown Road, our Trust Centre has never been busier, with over 25 different hirers offering an incredibly wide variety of activities, clubs and classes to local residents. There is a real need for every community to have such spaces for local clubs and organisations to meet and thrive. We were therefore delighted to announce in January 2023 the acquisition of the Methodist Church Halls’ lease in Southdown, ensuring that this valuable community resource remains available and accessible to the Harpenden community for many more years to come. The combination of the Southdown Halls (above the Co-op store at No.130a Southdown Road) and our existing Harpenden Trust Centre (at No.90 Southdown Road) means that the Trust now has a total of five large halls for hire, ranging from 300sqft to 1,560sqft. We are excited that this space also provides the Trust itself with some of the additional space required to support both our existing and our planned future community initiatives. We now have a combined total of 34 hirers across both the Harpenden Trust Centre and the Harpenden Trust Halls. The “Well Bean Café” staffed by Trust volunteers is to open in June 2023, the Ribbon Cancer Support Group that we are supporting has already begun meeting in the building, and we have already been able to offer some local charities space in the building. More initiatives will follow once the extensive refurbishment programme is completed and we look forward to welcoming everyone to our expanded space.
In response to various requests, the Trust is also excited to be taking possession of a new 16 seater minibus in 2023. The Harpenden Trust Community Minibus will be made available to any local Harpenden community group (whether a school, society, sports team, church or any other local group or organisation) to enable such groups far greater flexibility in expanding their offering to local residents.
Thanking everyone
To our Volunteers, our Funders and our long-standing Supporters - this has yet again, in yet another year, truly been the most fabulous team effort.
The Harpenden Trust is a voluntary organisation, everyone giving so generously of their time and their experience in support of the Trust wholly free of charge. The Trust simply could not achieve all that it does without the kindness and generosity of all its many, many volunteers - over 500 local people again during this last year! The Trust is such a collective team effort – and I would hope is also an equally rewarding organisation to be part of, especially as one experiences the positive impact we have witnessed across so many local people’s lives.
At times, a simple “Thank you”, two very simple words that we say time after time, feels somewhat inadequate. However, my Chair’s Statement is my opportunity each year to thank more formally everyone who has been able to assist so many individuals, families, charities and organisations across our local community. Everyone has played their part – from all my colleagues on the main Trust Board; to the members of the Care Fund and Community Fund Committees; to the members of the various related sub-Committees and teams that volunteer in all these areas; to those who have established the Harpenden Wellbeing Hub and all the many related Wellbeing initiatives; to those who now form the new Property Team and Facilities Team as our expanded footprint in Southdown starts to take shape; to the Trust Office teams answering the phones each day, and those arranging the hall bookings; to the Care Fund Home Visitor teams - whose work is so often and necessarily anonymous and hidden from plain sight; to all those so kindly befriending local residents; to those members of the Audit, Risk and Governance Committee and Investment Committee who carefully monitor and oversee our assets and governance; to the Trust's annual Christmas Appeal team, involving Area Organisers and so many individual Street Collectors; to all the volunteers at the Harpenden Library, to the Minibus Team seeking to provide additional resources to benefit local groups and local organisations; to the continuing volunteers at our GP surgery vaccination centres; to the External Affairs team building awareness of the Trust’s work through fabulous Newsletters and our various media channels; and indeed to everyone else who has made such a difference to the Harpenden Trust over the course of the last year. Thank you everyone.
We would like to thank all the Board members who worked tirelessly throughout the year. We would also like to offer a very warm welcome to Emma Deutrom, Mike Gosling, Sarah Holmes, Mike Kelly and Andy Lynes who all joined the Harpenden Trust Board during the course of the year. We also thanked Dennis Andrews, John Goodson and Nigel Pritchard who stepped down from the Board with our thanks and very best wishes for all they have achieved and contributed to the Trust over the years.
It has been a huge privilege personally over the last year continuing to work alongside so many wonderful local people, supporting local residents across our Harpenden community.
And thank you also to the residents of Harpenden who support our Christmas Appeal each year with such generosity. The Harpenden Trust’s Christmas Appeal is an incredibly important source of revenue for the Care Fund – and this year’s total funds raised of over £60,000 served yet again to highlight the kindness, compassion and generosity local people have for their neighbours in Harpenden.
Thank you everyone for the extraordinary kindness shown by so many; for everyone’s generosity with their time; for the continued fun, laughter and friendships built along the way.
It has been another year when the Trust has truly lived up to its founding principles.
“We’re here to help”.
Richard Nichols
Chair of the Board
(For the Year Ending 31 March 2023)
Link to Annual Report 2023 here.
05 October 2023