On Wednesday (8 March 2023), Washington Court was delighted to host Andy Street, West Midlands Mayor, for a visit.
Washington Court is a 101 bed hostel in Central Birmingham and is the only commissioned emergency bed provision in the City as well as the gateway to further support. Mr Street has visited previously, and the team took the opportunity to remind him of all the hard work that they do to support people rough sleeping in Birmingham.
Mr Street met with Helen Litherland, Executive Director of Housing, Care, and Support; Brian Carr, Chair of Trident Group Board; as well as the Homeless Support Teams. David Watson, Head of Support Services, and Service Leads, Paul McKeown, Azad Azam, and the Rough Sleepers Outreach Team leaders all explained how their services support people affected by homelessness in Birmingham.
The Homelessness Pathway that was commissioned in 2019 works to reduce the number of people rough sleeping, helping them into housing and connecting them with support services and wider partners.
Andy Street also met some of our residents and they had the opportunity to speak about their experiences when rough sleeping and the positive support they have received. One of our former service users, Andrew, met Mr Street and told him how he now volunteers to help other people rough sleeping and is looking to work for us in the future.
We are pleased to have been able to host the Mayor for West Midlands and to showcase the work we do to help some of the most vulnerable in society. If you would like to support these services, please donate to Change into Action or report anyone you see rough sleeping to StreetLink so we can support them.