Brighton & Hove Street Outreach Service

It's Pride month, a time to celebrate and honour the LGBTQ+ community.

Sadly, those in the LGBTQ+ community are more likely to experience homelessness. Research from Stonewall shows that almost one in five LGBTQ+ people have experienced homelessness at some point in their lives. Rates are even higher amongst trans people, where around one in four people have experienced homelessness.

Remember: if you see someone sleeping rough, you can refer them via Streetlink.

Beautiful weather this morning to compensate for a very, very early start for all our outreach teams this morning doing the street count! If you see anyone rough sleeping please do submit a referral to us via https://thestreetlink.org.uk/

Wow! Throughout 2023 our volunteers contributed a total of 826 hours to the team! That’s 34 days! Thank you to our wonderful volunteers. We're excited to see what 2024 brings!

Worried about someone sleeping rough? You can help connect them to local support services by making an alert through Street Link in just 3 simple steps:
1. Locate - Send a pin of where you've seen someone sleeping rough
2. Describe - Give as many details as possible to help services identify them
3. Submit - Your alert will go to local support services who will go out to find the person
Visit https://thestreetlink.org.uk to make an alert.

Today is World Homeless Day, the day to draw focus to homelessness. Crisis estimates that in 2023 300,000 families could be homeless, and 150 million worldwide. Here in Brighton and Hove we are currently working with about 140 rough sleepers.

So how can you help? Well, you can donate to CGL's Street Outreach Service, or come volunteer with us! You could also write to your local MP or take time to educate yourself on the complex reasons why people rough sleep. Or, if you spot someone rough sleeping, let us know via Streetlink. No act is too little. Follow us for more.

https://www.changegrowlive.org/get-in-touch/donate
https://thestreetlink.org.uk/

Wow - BIG thank you to Vodafone UK for donating 125 sim cards to our team, each with 40gb of data each month plus unlimited calls and texts for a period of six months. No access to the internet is a major barrier to housing in this day and age so hopefully this donation will really help some people on their journey back into accommodation 📞❤️

We're hiring! We're looking for 2 new Outreach Workers to join our Navigators team. You'll be working with a fixed cohort offering long term support from the street into accommodation, aiming to ensure that they don't return to rough sleeping 🙏 If you want to work for an organisation that believes in people then you might be perfect for one of these roles on the Change Grow Live Brighton & Hove Street Outreach team. Click the link below for more info.

https://careers-changegrowlive.icims.com/jobs/10113/street-outreach-navigator/job?mode=view&mobile=false&width=1145&height=500&bga=true&needsRedirect=false&jan1offset=0&jun1offset=60

Hello lovely people of Brighton! We have just opened up a new 16-bed project in which we can support rough sleepers in Brighton. To help people feel settled and comfortable in their new home we're asking for donations of working televisions 📺 We can collect around the Brighton & Hove area. DM us if you're interested and don't forget to share! Thank you so much in advance 🥰

Hi everyone! One of our clients in a far-out temporary accommodation is really struggling to get into town to make all their appointments as they don't have enough money for multiple bus fares a week. Does anyone have a bike they're happy to give to this person? It would really make a huge difference in their life. Please comment below or DM us. Many thanks 🚴❤️

As Pride Month draws to a close, as well as celebrating 🌈 q***r joy 🌈, we wanted to share our stats showing that LGBTQIA+ people are more at risk of homelessness than heterosexual people, even in Brighton & Hove where 12% of the population report to be LGBTQIA+, but where 15% of our rough sleepers were openly LGBTQIA+. And although improved recording may play a role in this figure, in the last 6 months we saw a 50% increase in LGBTQIA+ clients.

For many homeless LGBTQIA+ people, their homelessness is a direct result of homophobia, often from their family, causing them to be kicked out or flee. Unwilling to put themselves through further abuse, many will then not approach the council or commissioned services for help due to fear of homophobic abuse at any provided accommodation. Instead, they may seek out inappropriate housing to keep ‘safe’.

Our team is dedicated to not only supporting LGBTQIA+ rough sleepers into appropriate and safe accommodation, but also to working with other groups and services across Brighton & Hove to both prevent rough sleeping and find creative ways to reach and support the so-called hidden homeless.

Happy Pride from the Brighton & Hove Street Outreach Service 🌈

Today 20th June is World Refugee Day - Did you know that newly recognised refugees are at a high risk of rough sleeping?

Newly recognised refugees only have 28 days before they are evicted from asylum accommodation, they face enormous barriers to accessing private tenancies and are not supported properly to find a secure place to live.

This is no different in Brighton and our team work with a number of refugees who unexpectedly find themselves rough sleeping.

We stand with refugees.

Thank you to our wonderful volunteers for donating your time to support our service users. Here are some of ours celebrating Volunteers’ Week, an annual celebration of the millions of people across the UK that donate their time to support their communities 💜🧡

Would you like to volunteer to support temporarily-housed homeless people? Are you available for two hours once a week? Consider joining us as one of our Food Support Volunteers, collecting and delivering food for our clients temporarily-housed in guesthouses.

Click the link below to find out more, or contact Alice, our volunteer lead, via [email protected] or 07780 769132.

https://volunteers-changegrowlive.icims.com/jobs/10241/food-support-volunteer/job

We're hiring! 2 new Navigator roles, both in-reach and outreach, have been created for our team, and we're also looking to fill the Peer Worker position for someone with lived experience of homelessness after our 2 previous Peer Workers successfully moved into full-time roles 🙌 If you want to work for an organisation that believes in people then you might be perfect for one of these roles on the Change Grow Live Brighton & Hove Street Outreach team. Click the link below for more info.

https://careers-changegrowlive.icims.com/jobs/search?ss=1&searchRelation=keyword_all&searchCategory=44830&searchLocation=-13741-Brighton

We're hiring! Space has opened up on our team for a reconnections outreach worker so if you want to work for an organisation that believes in people then you might be perfect for the new Reconnections Outreach Worker position on the Change Grow Live Brighton & Hove Street Outreach team. Click the link below for more info.

https://careers-changegrowlive.icims.com/jobs/9638/reconnections-outreach-worker/job?mobile=false&width=1143&height=500&bga=true&needsRedirect=false&jan1offset=0&jun1offset=60

Hello everyone! One of our clients is having a tough time in temporary accommodation and would love a tablet to do the simple things like watch tv in the evenings. Does anyone have one they're happy to donate? Please DM us or share 🧡💜

We’re hiring! Are you someone with lived experience of homelessness looking to support people currently in need of our service? Then you might be perfect for our new Peer Worker position. This is a great role to gain work experience and build on your skills – our last Peer Worker has successfully moved into a full-time role and is thriving. Clink the link below to find out more.

https://careers-changegrowlive.icims.com/jobs/8807/peer-worker/job?mobile=false&width=1153&height=500&bga=true&needsRedirect=false&jan1offset=0&jun1offset=60

We're hiring! With one of our brilliant outreach workers off to London in a fantastic career move, space has opened up on our team for another outreach worker so if you want to work for an organisation that believes in people then you might be perfect for the new Outreach Worker position on the Change Grow Live Brighton & Hove Street Outreach team. Click the link below for more info.

https://careers-changegrowlive.icims.com/jobs/9257/outreach-worker/job?mobile=false&width=1153&height=500&bga=true&needsRedirect=false&jan1offset=0&jun1offset=60

New Year is a wonderful time to reflect on the year gone by. To that end we can confirm that in 2022 our volunteers donated a grand total of 1305 hours! How incredible. We really appreciate all the hard work and dedication from our volunteers and we look forward to working with them all in 2023! 💜🧡

It's been the most heart-warming thing to see so many people donate their Christmas decorations to the hotels we're managing this winter. Christmas can be a really tough time for some so we're hoping that this new joyful and festive look can bring a little cheer this holiday. Thank you SO SO much to everyone who donated - you're all absolutely wonderful. (We really did get a little emotional setting this all up!). Thanks again to all. Love, the Brighton & Hove Street Outreach Service. (Reposted due to minor changes).

It's really getting cold this week, with temperatures in Brighton dropping to "feels like" -7 degrees. If you see someone rough sleeping please refer them to us via Streetlink on 0300 500 0914, https://www.streetlink.org.uk/, or through the Streetlink app.

Woah! A massive thank you to our volunteers who donated a HUGE 155 hours this month! Superstars one and all 💜

Hello people of Brighton! We're currently running two small accommodations for rough sleepers for the winter period and were wondering if anyone has any spare Christmas lights, tinsel or decorations they could donate to them to bring some yule tide cheer? 🎄That'll get you a spot on Santa's nice list! ⛄️ Please let us know in the comments or DM us. Thank you! ❄️

We want to say a HUGE thank you to Pizza Pilgrims and the North Laines Fatto a Mano for donating delicious pizzas to get us through our street count 💜🍕 we couldn't make it through to 5am after all that walking without you!!

One of our clients has recently secured longer-term housing ⭐️ he is a budding musician and is on the lookout for an electric guitar - please let us know if you or someone else can help out with this! 🎸🎸🎸

The start of the new month means another volunteer update! Thanks so much to our wonderful volunteers who donated 20 hours to us in October. We couldn't do this without you ❤

Thanks a million to Cranks Bikes Brighton - DIY Bicycle Workshop who donated a bike and a lock to one of our clients who is no longer rough sleeping. It'll make a great difference to his life 💜🧡

Today is World Homeless Day, the day to draw focus to homelessness. Crisis estimates there are 227,000 rough sleepers in the UK, and 150 million worldwide. Here in Brighton and Hove we are currently working with over 140 rough sleepers.

So how can you help? Well, you can donate to CGL's Street Outreach Service, or come volunteer with us! You could also write to your local MP or take time to educate yourself on the complex reasons why people rough sleep. Or, if you spot someone rough sleeping, let us know via Streetlink. No act is too little. Follow us for more.
https://www.changegrowlive.org/get-in-touch/donate
https://www.streetlink.org.uk/

We liked this segment so much we decided to celebrate it monthly! Thanks so much to our wonderful volunteers who donated 25 hours to us in September. We couldn't do this without you