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Moss Side and Hulme Community Development Trust, Manchester |
 When you hear about Moss Side, it’s usually for shootings or
stabbings,’ says Hartley Hanley, chair of Moss Side and Hulme Community
Development Trust. ‘But there are plenty of positives that rarely get
reported.’
Perhaps the biggest ‘positive’ in the economically disadvantaged Manchester district is the new Windrush Millennium Centre, which opened in December 2006. The £3m community facility provides employment advice, job search assistance, training and skills development, and business premises for the local neighbourhood.
For the area, which has an infamous reputation for riots, drugs turf wars, crime and inner city blight housing, it is a concrete example of essential new investment, totalling more than £400m to date, which has been ploughed into local regeneration.
The trust, which was set up in 1989, initially aimed to give residents a greater say on issues affecting their neighbourhood. Since then, it has focused on helping people find employment. But in order to maximise its potential, it needed to find a home.
Building the Windrush Millennium Centre proved a huge financial undertaking. Even with a £1.5m grant promised by the Millennium Commission, a further £100,000 raised from Kellogg’s, City
College Manchester and the trust itself, and applications to the European Regional Development Fund and the North West Development agency pending, the funding package was extremely precarious.
The trust welcomed the invaluable support given by the ACF through a grant and loan totalling £320,000. The package acted as the gel that helped bind together the potential partners, thus contributing towards a lasting community asset.
Today the trust has around 800 members, 90% occupancy rate and is looking for new revenue streams to ensure the organisation’s financial independence.
Hartley is encouraged by the fact that there is still plenty more to do. ‘This is just the start,’ he says. ‘Our goal has always been social and community cohesion and that is an ongoing process. I want to see how we can encourage, develop, deliver and maintain high quality economic and social facilities for future generations.’
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