Each month, we’re highlighting a local charity working in a range of ways to make our communities better. This month we talked to The Upper Room in Shepherds Bush which have been feeding the local homeless community for over 25 years. Find out more about their amazing work here and how you can get involved:
Tell us about the charity.
The Upper Room is based in Shepherd’s Bush and has been feeding the homeless for over 25 years. It has evolved into three linked projects which aim to improve the life chances of its beneficiaries. All of its services are free and our mission statement is ‘improving lives’.
UR4Meals alleviates poverty by providing meals and essential survival services for 80 to 120 disadvantaged or homeless people five days a week.
UR4Jobs is a multilingual employment support service which aims to break the circuit of unemployability and homelessness through entry-level skills training, bilingual counselling and access to jobs. It provides support to over 400 people every year.
UR4Driving aims to improve the employability and reduce re-offending of 30 ex-offenders by teaching them to drive in return for voluntary work in its food redistribution service. To date more than a hundred ex-offenders have obtained a driving licence and only nine have re-offended. UR4Driving won a Big Society Award in 2013 and was shortlisted in the Guardian Charity Awards 2014.
What are your funding sources?
Approximately 90 percent of our funding is from grant-giving trusts and charitable foundations. We receive about 10 percent (£30,000 to £40,000) in donations from individuals, churches and schools in the local community. This is invaluable as it is usually unrestricted funding and can be used to support our core services, such as UR4Meals, which is not always the most attractive project to funders.
What are any obstacles your organisation faces?
A shortage of affordable housing is the biggest obstacle our beneficiaries face. As an organisation, funding is undoubtedly a permanent challenge, given that there is ever-increasing competition for available funds. Also, the priorities of funders change: one year ex-offender rehabilitation may be popular, another year it might be black and minority ethnic projects. Therefore each project has to be flexible enough to contract if insufficient funds are raised.
Another challenge is securing accommodation at an affordable rate. Our UR4Driving project is now based at Ealing, Hammersmith & West London College in Barons Court. Whilst this presents exciting opportunities for our driving students to enrol on the college’s vast range of courses, the rent is significantly higher than we had originally budgeted for.
Do you hold fundraising events throughout the year?
Yes, we do. For example, we held a riverside walk last week with a local historian. On the 17th of December we will have a merry band of carol singers at Turnham Green tube station—music and words are provided, so do join us! This event and others are listed on our home page under the heading ‘News and events’.
How can people get involved?
The Upper Room wouldn’t survive without its team of loyal volunteers. UR4Meals needs volunteers in the evenings to serve meals, chat to clients and clear up. Most volunteers attend regularly on the same night, even if it is only once a month. A few volunteers come during the afternoon and assist the chef with the chopping of vegetables (but again this needs to be regular, not a one-off). UR4Jobs can use volunteers to help with general administrative tasks, translating, uploading statistics onto the database and so on. It is largely down to the volunteer’s skill-set, and their availability. If you are interested in finding out more, please email the UR4Meals Project Manager Cecilia Seres on cecilia.seres@googlemail.com.
The Upper Room always welcomes donations of good quality (and clean) adult clothing—especially warm coats, shoes, socks and pants—and sleeping bags. Most of our clients are male. If you wish to bring any goods to The Upper Room, the office is open on a daily basis but we suggest you call the office first on 020 8740 5688 to arrange an appointment.
And of course the Upper Room would welcome donations of any size either online or by cheque to our address, listed on our website.
For more information, visit the Upper Room’s website.
