The first meeting of our Wednesbury support group was a great success. This was the first of our town-based groups and forms part of our plan to take our services out to each of the six towns of Sandwell. The launch took place at South Staff Water’s Community Hub in Wednesbury on 31 January.
The group’s already showing its potential to become a valuable asset to the community. As a result of our publicity, someone who hadn’t heard of us before came along and joined SVI to get more support. One of our existing members, who doesn’t come to our other activities, took the time to come and see us in their own town. Several of our members from the Wednesbury area turned up to find out what it was all about.
We helped people who needed advice to operate mobile phones and discussed a range of local, Wednesbury-based services.
Working with other organisations is always an effective way to get things done. Three people signed up to the South Staffs Water Priority Service and found out about the Assure tariff. And Healthwatch Sandwell was there to listen to people’s experiences of accessing NHS services.
The next Wednesbury Groups are on Friday 13 March and Wednesday 24 April from 10.30am to 12noon at the South Staffs Water Community Hub.
You don’t have to be an SVI member to attend these groups. If you are someone you know has problems with their sight, please do come along and join us.
We will be coming to other Sandwell towns too. The Oldbury group will start on Thursday 6 February 10.30am to 12noon in Oldbury Library, Jack Judge House, Halesowen Street, Oldbury B69 2AJ. More dates and venues will be announced for other towns over the coming weeks.
