St. Alban's Church is at the heart of community life in Offerton (Stockport).
As well as church activities, we promote, organise and host a huge range of community activities aiming to improve community cohesion, equip young people with valuable skills, support young families, promote fitness and wellbeing, and overcome isolation in older people. Our work involves a significant cross-section of the community, and we have a growing pool of volunteers who are involved with the many facets of life at St. Alban's. The church welcomes over 1000 visitors a year, and is used by over a dozen local groups, providing a wide range of activities, events and clubs for local people to enjoy.
In addition to the church itself, there is a large room attached to the church (the Galilee Room), complete with small kitchen which is used extensively by various church and community groups. The Galilee Room and kitchen were completed in the late 1960s, and are now unsuitable for modern requirements. There is no disabled access, and there are no disabled washrooms at the church, which is becoming a real problem as more people use the building. The kitchen is cramped, and proving to limit what we can do in terms of catering for events, etc, and presents health and safety issues.
This project involves installing a disabled washroom and a disabled access ramp at the front door (including new front door screen), refurbishing the existing washrooms, and expanding the kitchen facilities to meet modern requirements.
The whole community will benefit from this project. The new facilities will mean that wheelchair users and parents with pushchairs can fully access the church in a safe manner. We really value the importance of food in bringing people together - the enlarged kitchen will mean that the church can offer much improved catering facilities for community events, etc. Better facilities would benefit not just church members, but the very many groups who use St. Alban's, plus others we have had to turn away because the church doesn't meet their disabled access requirements, and because the catering facilities are inadequate.
This project is going to cost £68,000. That sounds like a lot, but we've already managed to raise £63,750 towards the project - leaving a shortfall of just £4250!
Please help us to transform St. Alban's into an even better space for the local community to use and enjoy! Every donation, no matter how small, will help us to reach our target and improve the church for the benefit of everyone.
Thank you!