Situated at the heart of the local voluntary and community sector since 1968, Community360 is an independent, charitable infrastructure organisation whose aim is to inspire groups to seize opportunities and become more enterprising and sustainable. We achieve our mission through a number of projects, including an experienced Community Development team, Community Accounts Service and Business Bank. As a result, staff lead on community volunteering programmes with more than 400 volunteers, work with over 300 community groups a year to access funding, embed good financial practices, recruit their own volunteers, plan and train, as well as network and promote what they do.

Across all of our projects we have sought to apply our Asset Based Community Development (ABCD) approach – utilising what is working well, learning from others, trying to do things differently so that it can benefit us all and joining with others in order to have the biggest impact. This has contributed significantly to the outputs and outcomes of the team.

Community Development

What We Have Achieved

1,497 enquiries received through My Social Prescription including outreach at locations such as Colchester Hub

My Social PrescriptionSocial Prescribers have sought over the last year to meet with teams, including occupational therapists, the emergency assessment unit team, and the ‘matron at the door’, to bring activities to patients; teach trainee social workers about voluntary services and be involved in team meetings.

£543,761 extra raised by groups with our assistance

16th December 2016Official opening of Shopmobility at Winsley’s House, enabling 40 members to use the scheme at anincreased capacity of five days a week.

Shopmobility

We have worked with Colchester Borough Homes (CBH) by bringing volunteers in to the organisation as well as facilitating staff volunteering in the local community. The volunteers are providing a range of skills and activities that improve the wellbeing of CBH residents.

New projects, such as A2B Friends (managed across Community Transport and Community Development) have addressed social isolation by hosting IT help sessions, and organising group excursions.

CASE STUDY‘I have worked with [MSP] in relation to a case, the gentleman was socially isolated and had limited support networks. MSP was a very positive and engaging process as it was based on a strengths/asset based approach. [MSP] supported the gentleman to look at volunteering opportunities where his skills could be utilised and with the volunteering application process. The gentleman lacked self confidence, but [the staff member] ensured she was responsive and sensitive in her approach. She explained MSP and each part of the process, answering all his questions fully. The gentleman is now ready to start volunteering and is positive about the benefits this will bring to his wellbeing.’

16,651 Time Bank hours recorded in Colchester, supporting the Essex Time Banks partnership which recorded over 53,000 hours

Lunch & LearnHour long sessions, consisting of a presentation of approximately 35-40 minutes, followed by Questions and Answers, providing a great opportunity for networking. Since launching in October 2016, average attendance has doubled per month from public and voluntary sectors. As a result of attendance we are seeing positive outcomes.

As one attendee commented:“I’ve made contact, and met up with [Essex County Fire and Rescue Services]. We’ve arranged several partnership meetings, as well as a better understanding of each other’s areas of work”

Over the course of 2016-17, we integrated TACMEP (formerly Tendring and Colchester Minority Ethnic Partnership) into the Community Development team. We have been able to continue case work, supporting people from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities to achieve their goals and access services. In groups and training, including ESOL, volunteering and employability sessions, the attendees have been able to progress on to further learning, sign up as a volunteer and gain employment.

The value for clients is clear, as one group member stated - “I get company, I get advice and we all share our experience. You enjoy company and looking forward to see people from different nationalities.”

325 voluntary and community groups supported in Colchester and Braintree over the last year

85 events attended, facilitated or organised - including Volunteer Week, Community Marketplace and Protecting People Through Partnerships

110 learners enrolled on adult learning courses

1,000 people reached through Stay Well this Winter promotional campaign

£30,604 in kind support from local businesses through Business Bank

Steve Lawton – Colchester Korban Project Manager – ‘As a small charity, we have not had the luxury of a designated fund raiser or grant bid writer, so have suffered for some time, not being able to see our project expand to address the needs that we see around us. In 2016, we embarked on a journey to try and raise a significant amount of money to set up a second property and cover associated costs such as staffing. This was new territory, so we needed all the help we could find. I was given some details of [the Community Development Team] and made contact…[a team member] was able to hear our story to get a feel for the vision that we held. She was extremely helpful in assisting us to home in on what we really wanted to do. [She] sent us resources, made recommendations, gave us information on upcoming grants, and looked over the grant applications we were putting together, giving valuable insight from a funder’s perspective. I’m pleased to say that we have managed to raise £50,000 towards our goal of setting up a move-on house, supporting homeless young people.’

Volunteers WeekWe travelled across Colchester to promote the potential to volunteer, both physically and virtually. We also hosted a Volunteers’ Tea Party to say thank you to our own team of volunteers. Social media campaigns reached more than 2389 impressions through Twitter (twice as many as had been achieved by any previous campaign). The knock on effect was an increase in volunteering enquiries by 15% at the half year point. We were able to place volunteers in specific roles across many different organisations, including Keep Britain Tidy, with a CBH staff volunteering event.

In March the Protecting People Through Partnerships event welcomed over 200 people to Chelmsford City racecourse in a joint ECVS, Safer Essex and Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner conference.

1,482 enquiries for volunteering opportunities

Vision :

‘Thriving Local Communities’

Mission:

“To inspire and enable local community action to improve

quality of life”.

We aim to do this in line with our core values, which are to:

• Provide passionate, intelligent leadership for the sector in Colchester, Essex and beyond;

• Empower people, groups and organisations through high quality support;

• Be creative and innovative in meeting the needs of local communities and the voluntary and community groups and organisations that serve them;

• Be fair and honest in everything we do.

In March 2017, we held the first Independent Advisory Group meeting for community members to work more closely with Essex Police. The turnout was outstanding with more than 40 people.

In September African Families in the UK became the first group to take advantage of the new opportunity to promote services at the Community Hub.

We completed our first year on secondment at Colchester Hospital co-ordinating volunteer services. We have also introduced Pet As Therapy (PAT) dogs in to the hospital

Who Is Community360?

1st April 2017 - merger of CCVS and Braintree CVS (BDVSA) to form Community360with an underlying commitmentto continue to provide valuablesupport to the voluntary andcommunity sector across bothColchester and Braintree.

1st September 2017 -merged with Voluntary Sector Training (VST). We are very excited about VST becoming part of Community360, which will bring opportunities and strength for both organisations.

OneColchesterOur aim is to encourage our citizens to be empowered and self-managed, leading to more resilient communities securing lasting improvements to local life for future generations.

Home from Hospital

Welcome to this year’s version of our annual report - Full Circle, which we feel depicts very nicely our new organisational branding and impact delivery.

We are really proud of the developments that Community360 has been through, bringing and enabling voluntary sector action to move from strength to strength.

Do take some time to look through the vast array of work that partners have contributed to over the last year and keep a watchful eye on the Newslinks and website for future projects and opportunities to be involved in for your local community as we move even further towards self-care and asset based community development.

Thank you to all our partners, stakeholders, staff and particularly our volunteer workforce for all that they do and remember as long as “we care – we can”.

Cate Cussell - Chair of Trustees.

Our schemes across Colchester and Maldon have once again proved to be an invaluable service to our members who seek an alternative, door to door and reliable transport service.

“The service makes my life easier as I do not have to worry about getting to medical appointments and home again”

Community Transport

“I come on the weekly excursions for friendship and an enjoyable day out, without the trips I could go three weeks without seeing anybody.”

We are currently reviewing our fleet of buses and are pleased to confirm that following fundraising from our Colchester transport members, local businesses and grant funds we have now purchased this new mini bus. Fully converted to enable wheelchair use, it is already a hit with our passengers! The review of the fleet continues as we have now started fundraising for Maldon.

New Mini Bus

Mill Road Therapy Centre

Working in partnership with Anglian Community Enterprise (ACE), we provide a “park and ride” shuttle bus service from Weston Homes Community Stadium to Mill Road Therapy Centre for patients who have physio appointments and who are unable to access the Mill Road car park. This service runs between 7am and 7pm Monday to Friday (except bank holidays). The service started in October 2016 and up to March 17, we transported 2805 patients and carers. We are delighted that ACE are funding us to continue until March 2018.

“It gives me a sense of achievement to help people that are disabled or elderly to get out of the home and have the opportunity to meet different people”.

70 The number of volunteer drivers that we currently work with.

Passenger Journeys

75,230 passenger journeys delivered last year across both Colchester and Maldon (13% increase on the previous year).

“It enables me to take my wife to a community singing group that gives her so much pleasure”

Community Accounts Service

The Community Accounts team have supported and worked with a variety of groups this year, ranging from Independent Examinations to Payroll and one off advice where needed. We have been involved for a third year in the Essential Living Fund, run by Essex County Council, which allows people in need the opportunity to access food and furniture. Through this fund we have contributed in supporting 1,040 people and supplying 6,244 pieces of furniture.

Home-Start Harwich:“I recently attended a training session under the Voluntary Sector Training for QuickBooks. Having done nothing quite so intricate using a accounting software package, throughout the training it become very clear to me how much this would benefit our charity in many ways, be it reports for trustees; reporting to funding partners and agreeing income and expenditure, and being able to supply a more professional package to all.

After the end of the training session I spoke with the Facilitator… and we agreed that I would come back and speak to my board and move forward with more in-depth training of QuickBooks, which Community360 would come to our office and provide.

This was all agreed and training provided. I have to say my life has been made a lot easier with using QuickBooks and the training provided has enabled me to provide my board and funding partners with more professional reports. I also know that I can speak to Community360 should I need further help or support as this can be given remotely via QuickBooks.Thank you so much for your…patience and guiding me through the process.”

QuickBooksWe have completed QuickBooks reports training in partnership with Voluntary Sector Training and from this we then had an influx of QuickBooks training of all aspects from initial set up to further training.

Bed RegisterWe have been involved in a new project with the CCG called the bed register where we have weekly contact with care homes in North East Essex to enable a central point of contact for people in need of care homes. This will develop further to have a link on our website so that people can access the information easier.

133 groups worked with this year

54 groups worked with this year, providing the payroll services

Colchester Community Voluntary Services

“I have always valued the service I receive. The timekeeping is good and the drivers very helpful”

2,551 Excursion trips delivered this year across Maldon and Colchester

Braintree District CouncilEast of England CO-OPColchester Borough HomesEasyfundraisingEssex Community FoundationAnglian Community EnterpriseColchester Hospital University Foundation Trust

Community Initiatives FundEssex Country CouncilColchester Borough CouncilWaitroseNorth East Essex CCG

Winsley’s House, High Street, Colchester, CO1 1UG

01206 505250 Information@community360.org.uk community360.org facebook.com/community360 @community360org Community360org

Registered Charity number: 1092567 Registered Company number: 04426567

Community Marketplace

Acknowledgements:

ACCOUNTS SERVICEVOLUNTEER COMMUNITY TRANSPORT

BUSINESS BANK SHOPMOBILITY WELLBEING

‘Thriving Local Communities’