Who are we?
We are the United African Association,who are a Northampton based charity and we were set up to support the local African community in Northants.
We are currently running 2 warm banks, one during the week at our main office and one on Saturday afternoons at our local Community Room in Northampton. Our beneficiaries currently really struggle with heating their own homes due to the rising cost of living, plus providing enough food to feed their families, so we set up these warm spaces to assist with this.
Our activities include a foodbank on Saturday mornings which provides people with culturally appropriate food and we also provide lunchtime food to our foodbank volunteers, most of whom suffer from food poverty themselves and some of them are also foodbank recipients. We also invite neighbours living locally to come and share the lunch. These people have been referred to us from public sector departments. There is also the opportunity for them to stay on and enjoy the warm bank activities.
Our warm space activities include befriending services, volunteer opportunities, lunch and refreshments. The Saturday afternoon/evening warm space in addition to free refreshments, also offers a variety of activities for children, including board games, table tennis, pool, crafts, as well as pamper sessions and exercise sessions for parents, and music, dance and African drumming for all. The weekday warm space at the office also allows use of our IT facilities, as well as opportunities to chat with staff, volunteers and other visitors. Plus assistance is available for vulnerable people with welfare concerns.
Our African drumming community group, the Dancing Drums is a big part of the organisation. Practice sessions are held at the Community Centre weekly, with a beginner's workshop beforehand. All these above activities are free and open to all, regardless of age, gender, ethnicity and disability. We also provide reasonably priced IT sessions & swimming sessions.
In addition we have received funding for other activities, including Grow Cook Eat, men's mental health sessions and a music workshop, which we will provide free of charge.
Community impact
Our organisation supports the local African community as well as the wider community. The warm bank idea was initially created to assist those struggling with food and fuel poverty, as well as the reports of isolation we were getting from service users. The current cost of living crisis has severely affected many of the people we support who without our assistance would have very little or nothing to eat. The office space is accessible by a lift and the community room is fully accessible and also wheelchair friendly.
Since launching, we have seen an increase in both volunteers, in attendees and more importantly fantastic feedback from foodbank recipients. especially with the music, eating and dancing at the Saturday warm space events, which have brought together people of all ages, races and religions.
Why are we crowdfunding?
We are crowdfunding to expand our warm space project. Currently we provide warm snacks, which may be the only hot food our beneficiaries have all day. They tend to rely on these spaces as somewhere to go which is warmer than home and they can get free hot food. Some may be asylum seekers who often have very little or no income, due to having no recourse to public funds.
We want to extend the warm space hours, as well as provide hot meals and not just warm snacks. Additionally wish to increase the welfare support to include Saturdays, as there is a clear need for this, too.
The friendships that have developed as a result of the warm space activities has been amazing, with one lady saying that for the first time in many years she is enjoying life and not simply existing. We want to continue offering this kind of support and offering other people young and old the opportunity to come together and form friendships.
How we’ll spend the money raised
The money raised will be used to meet the increased demand for warm spaces in our community. Any extra funds would be used to purchase food items, as well as as well as hire a cook to provide full hot meals. In addition, we would be able to extend the hours these are open, plus provide additional welfare services on Saturdays.