We are absolutely delighted to have received a massive pledge of £7,000 from Sunderland Council's Public Health Fund! Our staff and volunteers and service users have worked really hard in raising much needed funds! Some of our Community Partners have also supported us and we have also supported them and their projects to enable us to all work together for the benefit of the local people that we are aiming to support! THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO HAS SUPPORTED US!!! We have had well over 100 people involved in raising funds to back this project with groups of women and volunteers coming together to support this fantastic provision! We will be delivering two Warm Spaces on new days and times - one on the evening and one during the day time and both will have a benefits advisor present! We were supported by Sunderland Council to fund our Advice & Crisis Staff at FISCUS Warm Space, Ryhope CA Warm Space and Farringdon Foodbank Warm Space over the winter months. As a result not only did we have 128 attendances at the Warm Spaces, £177,669 has been identified for local people using the warm space in Benefits they were entitled to but were missing out on! A further 12 people were supported to manage their combined personal debts of £34,786. We learned a lot from the Pilot and we are going to develop our Warm Space to make it even better and this will run throughout the year. People attending the Warm Space have commented on how great it is to have somewhere to go to save on heating and electricity bills as well as getting a friendly welcome, hot food, drinks and refreshments and the opportunity to meet other people and reduce isolation for people attending with many attendees living on their own. Volunteers at the Warm Space have also delivered meals to people in the community who are struggling with the cost of living. Everyone has been so grateful and kind. THANK YOU SO MUCH :) FROM EVERYONE AT @Team FISCUS xxx

Wow what a way to end the week! We are absolutely delighted that we have been pledged a massive £3,466 from the Integrated Care Board today! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! We are now 50% funded towards our target! Our staff and volunteers have been very busy doing little fundraisers to help us reach our goal! This week our FISCUS S.A.F.E. Fundraiser has been asking people to sponsor growing a Sunflower for £1 - with a prize for the person growing the tallest sunflower in our beautiful community garden by 1st August! We chose this fundraiser because we grew so many of these beautiful flowers during COVID-19 . Everyone commented how they made people smile and improved the local area! S.A.F.E. is about providing Support, Advice, Food & Essentials to people who are struggling including supporting those who suffer with their mental health! Everyone benefitting from our warm space will have access to an experienced advice worker, hot food, a friendly supportive environment and other everyday essentials that are becoming unaffordable for so many people due to the cost of living crisis. People attending our S.A.F.E. Warm Space will also be able to enjoy our lovely community garden and our beautiful sun flowers being planted next week! A HUGE THANK YOU to all of our supporters we appreciate every £1 that has been raised!!!

A HUGE THANK YOU !!!!! To everyone who has pledged support towards our Sunderland S.A.F.E. Crowdfund! We have reached an amazing 30% of our funds!!! Here is a picture of our Social Welfare Worker Alison with a loaded van for one lovely family in need. This week we have already supported 8 families with Baby Bundles from our Baby Bank, issued 44 fresh & ambient food parcels and provided 5 adults with clothing from our Sunderland Clothes Bank Project, 2 new single beds for two children and bunk beds for another family. We also delivered a bike, a TV & a Microwave Oven (pat tested!). And, it's only Tuesday! By the end of the week our FISCUS staff and volunteers will have helped many more people at the community foodbanks and our Community Coop Centre in Hendon. This is only made possible by the FANTASTIC donations we receive and recycle!!! THANK YOU