“Show you care” has become the call to action by which the CCID’s Social Development department lives every day, encouraging stakeholders in the CBD to show compassion for those less fortunate, with the CCID leading by example.
Over the past year, the CCID has worked closely with one of its Central City NGO partners, Youth Solutions Africa, to sponsor the upgrade of the NGO’s Woodstock facility. Year round, it is now able to provide temporary shelter to 60 people in the form of beds, access to ablution facilities and two meals a day as well as social work counselling and group activities. The sponsorship, at just under R250 000, also enabled the CCID fieldworkers to ensure that at least 18 beds per night could be set aside for the CCID’s own clients.
Says Pat Eddy, manager of CCID Social Development: “It’s still a drop in the ocean when one realises we have around 700 people living on the streets in and around the CBD, but it gives our four full-time CCID fieldworkers some peace of mind that they can accommodate those who are most willing and most in need of shelter when they encounter them on the streets of the CBD each day.”
However, with winter approaching the CCID also decided to up the ante with a further sponsorship of just under R44 000, which is enabling an additional 30 clients to be accommodated nightly at the shelter during the worst of the rainy season. The sponsorship has been used to purchase 30 mattresses and bedding as well as to provide two meals a day to the additional intake. An additional 14 lockers (added to the 18 installed by the CCID earlier this year) allow users of the space to store belongings safely while using the YSA facilities.
“This sponsorship towards YSA complements the many other ways in which our Social Development team assists Central City rough sleepers every day, and particularly now through the winter months when help is needed the most,” says Pat.
For more information on the work done by the CCID Social Development department and its partner NGOs, see the Winter 2017 edition of the CCID’s quarterly newspaper, City Views.
Image: CCID fieldworker Shanien Stemmett chats to a group of Central City rough sleepers, by Ed Suter