Blackpool FC Community Trust column: Delivering for our residents at this crucial time

During this unprecedented time, a lot of our usual services have obviously been put on hold.

So while we try to find as many ways as we can to continue to support our regular participants, we have also introduced some new services.

One of those, after a call from Blackpool Council, was to open one of 12 community hubs in Blackpool to support our residents who have had to socially isolate for the 12-week period.

I can only imagine how difficult this must be for these people and we hope that our support – through the Blackpool Corona Kindness campaign – can help to make this period easier for them.

The Trust is supporting residents in the Bloomfield and Highfield wards, while our partners at Revoelution are supporting the Tyldesley ward, meaning that Blackpool FC Community Trust staff are supporting the whole area around the Bloomfield Road stadium.

The service currently provides people in need with weekly food parcels, provided by Blackpool Council.

We deliver these to their homes, but we are also including activity packs for people to hopefully enjoy and also a friendly face for people kept indoors to see and have a chat with.

We are hoping to extend the offer over the next couple of weeks to include collecting the other shopping needs of residents and possibly also their medication.

We are also doing some basic welfare checks too.

Blackpool Football Club have also been really supportive in this period and have emptied all the stock from the match-day kiosks so we can add some additional goodies to the packs, including bottles of pop, chocolate and crisps.

While we would normally tell our local people to eat such treats in minimal amounts –due to our healthy lifestyle projects, including Fit2Go and FitFans – a little bit of a good thing doesn’t harm anyone in a period like we are currently enduring.

The staff have been amazing, with 26 of our team members putting themselves forward to volunteer for this service.

A a couple of our team, Jen Crofts and Zoe Cunliffe, have taken on a co-ordination role to make sure all our orders are in on time and our deliveries ready for the rest of the team to collect and send out.

The service is being delivered from our new Education and Community Centre at the stadium.

For people to register their needs and make use of these services, please contact the central line via email on:

[email protected] or call 0808 196 30 80 (9am-5pm on weekdays) and our team will be out to see you as soon as we can.

Also, if anyone is aware of people who may benefit from individual or family packs in this period, please send them the information or register their needs too.

It’s important that everyone comes together during this time, so that anyone needing help is identified and help can be provided for them soon as possible.

Stay safe everyone and stay positive.

Kind regards

Ashley Hackett