Report transcript in: Easton Christian Family Centre

Please Report the Errrors?

Good morning,

thank you for sparing me some time.

Uh,

could you state your name and your community interest

company and what you provide for the community?

Yes,

um,

my name's Patrick Wickson.

I'm the Operations Manager here at Eastern Christian Family Centre.

Um,

we are a church and a community centre.

Excellent.

So you applied for the Community Resilience Fund.

You were successful in being allocated a portion of funding,

which is brilliant.

Uh,

so what have you spent,

er,

the grant money on the funding?

Yeah,

so,

um.

The main

chunk of money's on these windows that you see here.

Alright,

excellent.

And the old windows were

in a very bad condition.

In some places they were almost falling out.

Um,

they were probably the old original timber windows.

And

the other things,

the money was spent on some new doors,

cavity wall insulation,

and some cladding,

um,

at high level.

Around the building

we have a look?

Yeah,

yeah,

thanks.

Oh.

It's

a little bit wet

here.

Yeah,

it's raining.

So here's the cladding up here and it goes all around the building.

Excellent.

New windows all around the building.

Excellent.

Yeah,

the windows look really good,

don't they,

Cladding.

Yeah,

we were really

happy

with the work.

It was done.

In the work over the summer holidays,

which is when the um the sun's quieter,

yeah,

so.

yeah,

so we've seen some of the work

um that that's been done.

um what difference has this funding made to the staff here

and the wider community?

Yeah,

the,

the funding,

um,

so we got

about 66,000 pounds,

and I think

without

that,

we got that early on,

as I mentioned,

I wasn't here

at that stage when we applied,

but I think it really,

um,

boosted us and

gave us the confidence to.

think

at least we've got a start

because

um initially

we were um expecting the the cost of the

the work which

includes the roof,

which is the next stage now,

um,

was around 600,000 pounds,

so.

Yeah,

yeah,

we,

we were,

we were really kind of

worried how we'd get to that,

that amount

and,

um,

that,

that early money sort of really helped.

You did mention that

the cost was 600,000 and then by the time

you

Inquired further into it

that it had risen to

1.2 1.2 million roughly,

um,

employed

Hookways,

which is a chartered surveyor,

and they did a cost analysis,

um,

and by the time

that happened,

which was

May last year,

the,

the price has risen to just under 1.2 million.

And that's when I arrived when we just got that news.

OK,

good time to,

to appear,

is it?

Um,

so,

so you changed,

tapped,

and yeah,

so we were gonna prioritise the roof work first.

But um

we realised that we all the funding we had

um we needed to spend,

so we swapped

around and

the slightly lower amount for windows,

doors,

cavity wall

insulation and cladding

would be more achievable and we could,

sort of,

we nearly had the money,

so we,

we just decided to go with that and um

as I say,

we managed to,

Fundraise the rest of the money and get the work done over the summer.

Excellent,

yeah,

it's been really uh encouraging to us.

That's good,

that's good,

um,

has it made,

because I can see this is a staff office,

has it made a difference

to them I mean.

It looks,

first of all it looks great,

it makes the building look a lot more smart um

but aside from that,

the thermal comfort is

increased,

so now we're just getting to um sort of towards

October,

November,

um,

we're starting to feel the benefit.

It's not draughty,

the old

windows,

you know,

you can just feel the air coming in,

um,

so that'll really

sort of keep us warm this winter.

Excellent.

Um,

so you may not be able to answer this question,

but how did you find?

Filling out the application form,

how did you find the application process?

Yeah,

so I wasn't here,

um,

when we had the application,

but,

um,

we did

along the way have

other,

um,

bits

paperwork to complete,

and I remember at one stage Rosco were involved,

so we had some help from them filling in,

uh,

a sheet,

um,

so that was useful.

OK.

Um,

Yeah,

I mean,

There,

there is a fair amount of paperwork

and

I think

I understand why that is,

um,

but

the team have been really helpful in

kind of providing the

support

that we've needed to,

to complete all of that.

Excellent.

Um,

so what made,

you might not be able to answer this one as well.

What made you apply specifically for

this grant for the CRF funding?

Um,

well,

I don't know the exact reason,

but what I do know is that,

um,

anything.

Uh,

when we're fundraising anything that looks like

we can achieve it,

we'll go for,

this one is obviously available and it's a good,

a good chunk of money,

so.

Excellent,

good strategy.

Um,

so what

has impacted the delivery of your project?

You did

um.

Touch on it a little bit a moment ago,

so from filling out the forms or receiving the,

from receiving the funding to delivering the upgrades or or changes.

So,

um,

I think it's fair to say that um,

what's really

positively impacted us was employing

er the chartered surveyor to kind of

help us

tender the work.

Find the contractor and then manage the work itself

and

about 10%,

of the CRF funding

was towards their fees.

So that

was really it was really crucial.

The previous phase,

we managed to work ourselves again before I was here,

but

I think that was hard work.

We had some problems with the,

with the contractor,

um,

and this time.

Um,

yeah,

having,

having their support has really helped us,

um.

What else,

um,

any setbacks,

so the,

the big setback really was the increase in costs,

um,

so that,

that meant that we reprioritized what which pieces of work we,

we were gonna do.

So the,

the,

the windows and the doors,

um,

slightly lower cost than the roof,

um,

and that's

what we could manage fund

to,

to get the funds for.

So,

um.

Yeah.

OK,

you can sit up.

Um,

have your future plans changed since receiving the grant?

So has it meant you're able

progress,

um,

more groups are interested in the building

because of those changes,

or,

or has anything changed?

Well,

I don't know

how much it's connected to the new windows,

but the building is getting more busy,

and

I think.

As the building's more busy,

it's more and more important that

all of the far flung bits of it are are warm,

so the new.

Uh,

Windows are helping keeping

the kind of.

The bits that the rooms at the far ends of the building warmer,

so that's it's,

you know,

it's just much more comfortable,

yeah,

in the room that's not draughty,

um,

what about the staff,

do they appreciate it,

do they like it?

Well,

it definitely makes the environment

cleaner,

more pleasant,

so you know,

everyone's commented on that.

Things have improved.

It's a nicer environment and,

and

again,

I guess over the,

the winter we'll

benefit from it being

nice and cosy,

yeah,

excellent.

Um,

if you hadn't received the grant,

where would your

organisation be?

What would you have done?

Yeah,

I think it's fair to say

we'd

be a bit

further back.

We possibly wouldn't have

managed to get

to the point of actually doing this

work.

Number 1.

The early

award of the grant gave us confidence that we had,

you know,

a chunk of money upfront that we could rely on,

and then

number 2,

it's just like

a fair proportion of the overall total and to raise that

sort of from other means would have taken longer,

yeah,

both in terms of confidence and in

getting

to where we are more quickly.

Excellent.

Um,

if so it's time to dream big now,

uh,

if money was no object,

what would you

prioritise for the future of this,

um,

organisation?

So I mean like.

Just ridiculous,

like would you

put another extension on top of this,

would you buy these

buildings so that you were larger,

yeah.

Now,

have reached the point of thinking about the roof because it's still leaking.

The problem is it's a flat roof,

that will only have a limited,

uh,

lifespan,

so even when we replace it,

that won't last forever,

so we are

thinking

whether we should have a different roof

profile,

and we are

seriously thinking about whether we.

It would be best if you're gonna do that,

to go up another story.

Yeah.

And provide accommodation we're in an area where

um affordable accommodation,

you know.

Needed

and whether that that we can help the community,

um,

possibly,

we do a lot of work with,

um,

refugees and asylum seekers,

possibly,

um,

accommodation for them or the local community.

we're just at the beginning of

thinking big

like you're suggesting.

That's really good,

that's really.

Um,

what was,

sorry,

let me start again,

was there anything

different or unique

about the resilience fund,

uh,

application or the process compared with other funding?

So I know you didn't,

but you've been probably having a when I came in,

what was different was

one,

it was

the size of the,

the grant,

but,

but two,

the,

the team's support and uh.

Uh,

Careful,

um,

approach

to regular meetings,

making sure we're on track,

helping us,

trying to troubleshoot where there were problems or

find a support

where we

needed support.

So that,

that's

different from the other

people we got funding from.

Excellent,

great.

um,

so.

Where are the last questions.

Uh,

lastly,

how do you feel about the Community Resilience Fund?

Has it met your expectations and would you apply again if the opportunity arose?

Yeah,

yeah,

so,

um.

There is

a fair amount of work around paperwork and.

And

um keeping

kind of

in touch.

But

I think,

you know,

that's more than offset by the,

the amount of,

um,

support and financial assistance that we've received,

and also,

it's been nice to,

Um,

get to know the,

the team

and just feel that there's

someone else from outside the organisation that's

interested,

keeping an eye and kind of

can give you advice and support,

um,

and I guess they're,

they're used to

this field,

so it's.

They were able to put us in touch with other people trying to get a new roof

and things like that,

it's helpful because they see

the wider picture,

they can kind of link you up

and um provide support and advice,

so,

brilliant,

yeah,

thank you.

um,

lastly,

is there anything else you want to show me,

uh,

anything else you wanna add,

anything else you wanna say?

Well,

do you want to have a little tour of the building quickly?

Yeah,

sure,

thank you.

So as I said,

this is the office

next door we've got um.

Another organisation

using offices,

uh,

Bristol Hospitality Network,

and

they're actually doing what's happening.

Here

this is normally

the cafe.

The cafe runs here Tuesday to Friday,

but not on

Monday

because Christian Hospitality are doing their drop in.

Yeah,

this is the worship space,

the main hall where we meet at church on a Sunday.

OK.

You

see today

they're setting up for a drop in,

usually between 100 and 200 people.

So at the moment they're sitting for a person and there's

table tennis for

um sewing down at the bottom

have a

haircut here

OK,

excellent.

Um,

there's

another

upstairs,

OK,

Bridges for Communities,

uh,

the City Council used to have a children's centre office up there.

Um.

This is the Beehive centre which

is kind of over to a cafe you see.

The kitchen itself

with the,

OK,

there's a name in the flag.

Do you accept that for parents.

Uh,

food for the week.

OK.

This is the tree

So.

Here's some of the,

the work that um

goes on in the building.

Oh cool.

That's good.

And I'll just show you down here,

we've got

another kitchen.

So we've got

the

community kitchen.

People

in the community

who

can use and is used by.

Um,

for example,

today it was the Hospitality Network,

and we were

cooking for probably between 100 and 200 people.

Community kitchen

here.

And then just a

three,

here.

groups.

So here.

There's a little office in there,

this

partition

can be opened to make this into one big.

Excellent.

Yeah.

In terms of this phase of work,

we're,

we're almost done.

We just need to get a new ramp out here

for a new,

uh,

fire escape route outside

and then we'll be done.

Yeah,

so that's it.

Brilliant.

Thank you so much for your time.

You're welcome.

Alright,

cheers,

thanks.

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Posted By

Author

LaurenWT

Post date

04/11/2025