Threshold staff have made a significant contribution to rough sleeper counts in both boroughs.  Results came in a zero in both cases, however staff regularly work with people who have spent occasional nights on the street, and others who "sofa surf" at friends homes or have lived in very insecure housing.   Many thanks to Jannah Murphy, Sadie Ghaffar and Suzanne Harvey who took part in the Tameside count on 19 July, and to Mathew Noone and Stuart McNair who took part in Oldham's count on 22 October.

On Friday 10 October we finally closed the door on Steven House our Lees office, our administrative base for many years.  We now have modern offices on the top floor of Aksa House, next door to First Choice Homes and close to many other agencies in Oldham who provide services to homeless and vulnerable people.  Pictured is the final removal of our old Housing Project branded window sticker from Steven House , and some "windows" in to our new premises.

Threshold staff put on an exhibition stand at the recent Tameside Housing Advice centre open day.   We were delighted to support this excellent event at the centre which will shortly host our new partnership service for offenders leaving prison and returning to Greater Manchester.  Pictured from left to right are Lee Wilds, Services Manager, Neil Thomas, Service User Involvement Co-ordinator and Sana Riaz, Housing Support Worker from our BME floating support service.

The new Tameside-based Community Support Foundation has won a recent tender for a Greater Manchester Offenders service.  Threshold, as part of the Community Support Foundation consortium, will run the service in partnership with New Charter’s Tameside Housing Advice service.

The service has been commissioned by all ten Greater Manchester local authorities, the Prison Service and the Probation Service.

Community Support Foundation offers a unique partnership model of a housing advice service and a housing support provider working together to meet the housing needs of offenders.

The service will be based at the Tameside Housing Options service.  This will be the hub for all referrals for accommodation. It will be publicised widely to prisons discharging to the area, prisoners, all services and referral agencies working with prisoners who have a housing need; including prison housing advice services, and probation staff.

The service will be staffed by a Services Manager,  two Housing Caseworkers and an Administrator.

Look out for the posts being advertised on our jobs pages shortly.

The weather did not dampen the spirits of customers, staff and guests at the recent Step On and Celebrate event which was held on Thursday 30 July.

The event celebrated the end of a series of service user coaching and learning events to recognise achievements over the past twelve months. Customers who have accessed training, education, voluntary work and secured employment where awarded with certificates.

Oldham Cricket Club kindly provided the venue and all who attended enjoyed an action packed afternoon with lots of fun activities such as Circus skills, Oldham Athletic and the Wii Fit, face painting, treasure hunt, photography workshop, juice bar, magician and a bouncy castle for the children.

Local Hip Hop artist D -Rydah gave up part of his afternoon to perform at the event and also handed out copies of his recently released CD.

Threshold Choir “Smooth Sounds” which is directed by Carol Donaldson, a musical director who works with the Oldham College, made their debut performance at the event.

Special guests included The Mayor and Mayoress of Oldham, Alan Hardy, Chief Executive of Oldham Athletic Football Club and Councillor John McCann.

A great afternoon was had by all.

Abigail Birch, Janet Nadin, Judy Hallam and Karen Jones from the Central Support team braved the pouring rain on Sunday 19 July to take part in Cancer Research Race for Life at Alexandra Park, Oldham.  The team completed the 5K course despite heavy rain and extremely muddy conditions and have raised approximately £300 for a very worthy cause.

Here's to next year.

Poem written by an ex customer who wishes to remain anonymous:

"I am homeless", I say it everyday, I wish these words would go away.  All the time I walk down the streets, wishing there was someone I could meet who could see me and talk for a while - share a laugh, share a smile. 

It's not my fault I am this way but I must fight to survive each day.  For people look at me as if I am not there, they don't for the homeless, seem to care.

I walk all day and if I can, eat.  I find somewhere to rest, sometimes on my feet.  I try to see things as others might see, I'd love to live as others who are free.

And then one day my prayer came with hope, I found somewhere to live and now I can cope.  I walk down the street with a step in my stride, I can do anything, I don't have to hide.

I still see my friends on the street, I am always going to smile and give them a greet.  Because I am still one of them, it's fair to say, I'll always be their friend for everyday.

So next time you walk down the street, put out your hand and give them a greet then you will find and you will see, they are just like you, they are just like me.

Thanks Threshold

Threshold has been striving to improve ways of working with their key partners - in particular registered social landlords of our schemes. 

Threshold has been working closely with The Regenda Group, who are one of our landlords for many of our accommodation based services including Shepley House, Spring Street, Stamford Villa and Westbrook; to improve the day to day repairs within the schemes. 

The Regenda Group is a leading independent North West housing and regeneration organisation managing 13,000 homes for rent and sale across the North West. 

Threshold and Regenda are developing and implementing a range of new service protocols including new repairs, empty property standards and a programme of planned maintenance amongst other initiatives to improve the quality of the service received by Threshold service users.

As part of the development of the partnership, staff from Regenda’s shared service centre visited Threshold to give them an insight into the workings of our schemes and further developed the relationship between Threshold staff and service users and Regenda staff.

Nick Groom, Property Surveyor at The Regenda Group said ‘We are delighted to be improving our working relationship with Threshold and gain a much better understanding of how our businesses can work together to improve the service offered at our schemes. 

The recent visits help to forge better working relations, strengthen each others understanding of the services which combined help to benefit the customer.”