James O’Driscoll( Mill Road), Angus Ferguson (Mill Road), Etta King (Gray Street), Cathie Duncan (Manse Gardens), John Redpath (Hogan Court), Mary Paton ( Willox Park), Cathy Martin (Young Street), Jane Mack (Tenant Participation Officer) and Lee Bell (HSCP).
Apologies from Margaret Whitten and Tracey Whiteford (Lottery Fund).
Members were asked to share a piece of good news or something they had done recently that they had enjoyed to give a positive start to the meeting.
Lottery are changing computer systems which mean Tracey Whiteford couldn’t attend but will come to next meeting. Lottery are wanting complexes to split applications between Clydebank, Dumbarton and Alexandria but are happy for 9 complexes to put in a bid together this year.
WD need a treasurer to replace Eddy who resigned. Nominations were asked for but no one volunteered - Lee is going to speak to Theresa Connolly when they meet next week. Will need a treasurer for an application to be submitted.
Natalie very unwell so had a knock on effect on what can be done. Patience is appreciated and Lee attending to issues as soon as she can.
Big Bash plans had to be put on hold, cost ended up being too much but 30 people were interested, so looking at a different, cheaper venue. Are hosting a Halloween party at Argyle Bowling Club (near Vale of Leven Swimming Pool and Vale of Leven Health Centre) on 31/10/19 from 4:30 – 7:30pm. £8 for buffet and entertainment with free transport, fancy dress is optional. Tickets available from supervisor.
Few supervisor vacancies being advertised and will be interviewing in the next few weeks.
Tenant Priority Budget 2019/20
Special budget that tenants decide how it is spent.
Forum were advised of budget at the last meeting and there was an article in the summer edition of the Housing News and a number of sheltered complexes put in proposals.
There was a public meeting 29/8 to assess the proposals and agree what should go ahead. All proposals received were agreed or are being taken forward through existing work programmes,
Still money in the Budget so new proposals can be made.
Criteria is that it is an improvement that will benefit a number of tenants and isn’t something that the Council as the landlord should already be doing as a repair.
Review of Sheltered Housing Tenant Handbook
Thanks given to those who came along to the review meeting on 25/6.
Since then, have had a design company working on handbook and have also been in touch with a Digital Arts group based at the Concorde Centre whose volunteers will take up to date pictures of the complexes so will be looking for volunteers who are happy to get their photo taken.
Had hoped to have a draft version for meeting today but due to delays getting the text updated not been possible. Will get draft version out to those on review group and hopefully final version will be ready for next Forum meeting.
Date for diaries
Annual tenant event being held on Wed 9 October in Clydebank town Hall – open to all tenants and members of the Forum will all get invites through the post and
hope many will attend – transport and lunch being provided.
Any other business
Question asked if Housing Officers are holding surgeries? Lee confirmed that some are – Mill Road, Hogan Court & Willox Park all have regular ones.
Not had one for a year at Young Street or at Manse Gardens.
Action: Jane to email a reminder to all Housing Coordinators and will copy in Lee Bell.
Request made for another noticeboard for outside common room at Hogan Court and Lee agreed to arrange.
Question asked regarding Mil Road carpark as visitors to people from houses across road keeping using it – Jane confirmed that resident parking sign is only a curtesy and can’t be enforced by Police unless car is dangerously parked or obstructing access.
Concern at Gray Street raised regarding a delay in response to alarm being pressed – Lee advised that this should be raised at the time as she can contact call centre if the date is known and find out why there was a delay rather than leaving to a Forum meeting.
Lee wanted to highlight a recent bogus caller incident at Melfort Avenue – 2 ladies gained entry to a tenants house – trying to sell magazines but one then asked for a glass of water. Door was left open and alarm not pressed. Supervisors are reminding all tenants not to leave doors unlocked.
Police have dash-cam footage of the 2 ladies and police response was very quick – nothing was taken but essential that people learn lesson and ensure that they press alarm or dial 999 and do not leave doors unlocked.
Thursday 16 January, 2020, 2PM at Young street sheltered complex in Clydebank.
James O’Driscoll( Mill Road), Angus Ferguson (Mill Road), Etta King (Gray Street), Cathie Duncan (Manse Gardens), John Redpath (Hogan Court), Jean Massie (Melfort Avenue), Agnes Massie (Melfort Avenue), Margaret Stevenson (Melfort Avenue), Cathy Martin (Young Street), Jane Mack (Tenant Participation Officer), Natalie Clark (HSCP), Lee Bell (HSCP), Richard Heard (HSCP) and David Lynch (Housing Area Co-ordinator).
Apologies from Mary Paton, Margaret Whitten, Gaby Eldred and Margaret Deigman.
Members were asked to share a piece of good news or something they had done recently that they had enjoyed to give a positive start to the meeting.
Golden friendships – more complexes going regularly and newsletters will contain information on what is on. Lee providing transport. Etta advised she been going to club for over a year, went on trip and is now a active member and thoroughly enjoys the club. Etta advised nearly have the £80,000 needed to buy the club building. Even folk on their own will be made feel welcome.
Lee working on a programme for exercise over the summer – initial sessions not well attended. Coaches from leisure services will run classes and adapt for all abilities.
Bogus caller awareness needs to continue – been problems at Melfort in past and police did respond promptly.
Natalie has been pursuing Wi-Fi but not straightforward and still issues to be resolved– will need google accounts and range will be limited so will probably just cover common rooms.
Service Standards been discussed at the Forum a couple of times and Richard did some consultation at the complexes in February and been discussed with housing colleagues.
Copy of the draft Standards were circulated to the Forum members to consider and discuss. Service Standards should be measurable so that we can report on performance and focus on improvements at Forum meetings. Draft standards were discussed and agreed.
Next step is to review tenant handbook which includes the Service Standards and Jane looking for volunteers.
Jane to set up separate meeting.
Margaret, John, Etta, Cathy, Angus and Natalie happy to be involved.
300 tenants in sheltered housing and want the Forum to be representative. Representatives asked how they see their role and how do you share information?
John at Hogan Court said he feedbacks to folk at his complex at local meetings.
Minutes are often long and off putting so a Sheltered Housing newsletter suggested as being easier to read and the group agreed.
Natalie to develop and Forum newsletter.
Local meetings at each complex said to work well – not everyone can make them or want to come along but as long as people have the option. What needs to be improved is the feedback from the meetings.
Also raised that if some-one raised an issue at the Forum meeting they should get a direct response. Lee agreed this would be possible and that local issues should be raised at complex meetings and easier and quicker to get feedback.
Local complex meetings to be advertised and outcomes feedback to tenants.
Recruited 3 new members of staff on permanent basis so have a bigger group of staff to fill any supervisor vacancies.
Suzanne Gibson (Second Avenue) looking at what is going on in local area and sharing information with complexes.
Putting together a Sheltered Housing Big Bash – will be on 29 August at 543 club in conjunction with Jim McLaren of Golden friendship – 6 - 9pm - all sheltered housing tenants will be invited – bingo, karaoke clowns and quiz. Flyer been done and will be advertised to all sheltered complex tenants.
1st type of this event so will want feedback on what works well and want to see what people want.
Visit to Town Hall – Angus interested so Lee will let Suzanne know and she can contact Angus to arrange trip.
Lee has secured money to get communal windows cleaned – tenants responsible for own but common areas looking grubby. Now have a local window cleaner, Gary, and will do complexes front doors etc. to help make the complexes look better.
New Tenant Participation leaflet
Made as simple as possible while still emphasizing the range of opportunities people have – not just sheltered Forum – tenants have rights to be involved in consultations and scrutinising performance so if interested in any other options to see Jane.
Also produced a TP performance report to bring together our activities and the impact that tenants have had on decisions and policies. Copies issued and will be developed based on comments – so any comments welcome.
Tenant Priority Budget 2019/20
New financial year so new Budget - £400,000 is being used to accelerate the shower programme but that still leaves £400,000 to spend as well as a number of projects still ongoing from last year. Will include an article in the summer edition of the Housing News to promote tenants to submit proposals. Copies of forms available plus online.
John advised that Eddie of Mill Road is resigning from Forum and lottery committee which leaves a treasurer vacancy.
John completing lottery applications for money on behalf of Forum. Lottery people want 2 forms – Clydebank and Dumbarton Areas and can apply for up to £10,000 so really need two treasures and 1 secretaries.
Applications take 4 months to process so need to get form in soon so that can start.
Forum would be good opportunity to take forward lottery applications and will be put on agenda for next meeting.
[Following a further meeting with Lottery representatives, John advised that they now wanted each complex to make own application for Lottery funding so each complex would need to have their own committee and bank account – to be discussed at next Forum meeting.]
As Lee no longer works on a Wednesday was discussed if meeting day could be changed and agreed that Thursdays was possible. Therefore next meeting is on Thursday 5 September 2019, 2PM at Manse Gardens, Haldane.
James O’Driscoll Mill Road, Angus Ferguson Mill Road, Cathie Duncan Manse Gardens, Margaret Whitton Hogan Court, Suzanne Gibson (Supervisor) Second Avenue, Jim McLaren Golden Friendships, John Redpath Hogan Court, Mary Paton Willox Park, Margaret Deigman Willox Park, Jean Massie Melfort Avenue, Agnes Massie Melfort Avenue, Catherine Martin Young Street, Doreen Frame Young Street, Jane Mack WDC TP Officer, Natalie Clark HSCP, Lee Bell HSCP.
Lee welcomed everyone to the meeting and asked
everyone to share something positive.
Lee – Establishing good working relationships with housing and working together.
Margaret – The fish and chips tea had faltered for a while but now do it every week and have about 10 coming.
Angus – The complex got awarded gardening money to improve their communal garden and getting slabbing and a greenhouse.
Suzanne – Previously some of the tenants at Second Avenue had difficulty accessing the outside space but Housing have agreed to funding to put in a ramp and fix the doors to allow easier access.
Jim McLaren – Golden Friendship initiative to tackle loneliness is being made into a TV documentary.
Jane – My son is 18 today.
John – Through the tenant priority budget we got awarded £11,000 to get new flooring for Hogan Court closes.
Natalie – Now working full time within Sheltered housing.
Mary – finally have new chairs in the common room at Willox Park which will allow more social events to take place.
Jim initially started a club for people with special needs and disabilities. What they found was that the people that were coming were mainly over 60 and they were coming because they were lonely and everything grew from there.
Jim won citizen of the year in 2018 and for the award a video was made. The person filming was blown away by what they were doing and brought his boss back the next week to show him and they are now making a TV documentary . Regularly get over 200 people on a
Thursday.
On the 22nd of January this year had a Ball to raise funds and managed to raise £13,500.We now have a theatre company that comes to us and puts on a play for up to 150 people - their next play is in March.
Every Monday we put on bingo and a raffle. The money we take in for the raffle pays for the entertainment.
We are looking to buy the 543 club so need to raise £80,000.
For anyone on their own coming to our weekly events we
have people sitting with empty seats looking to meet and
welcome new people.
When they did Oliver in the town hall, we buy a number of tickets for the £12 and then re-sell them for £5.
Lee also advised that when plays/pantos have been put on HSCP been happy to pay for return taxi’s to assist sheltered tenants attending.
Jim’s e-mail address if anyone wants to get in touch or has
any questions is James.mclaren2@ntlworld.com and
complex newsletters will include details of future events.
Supervisor from Second Avenue sheltered complex but also been working one day a week to try and link in with community groups and activities out in the community and through Clydebank College.
Everyone has a skill – Suzanne goes to college to learn stained glass restoration because it was something she wanted to learn about. Important we all share these skills and she wants to create opportunities for people to share their skills.
Also a number of local activities - Clydebank Town Hall has a tour on just now which incorporates the old baths and the old holding cells.
They are willing to do one specifically for Sheltered Housing. They also have a project detailing the Singer factory which you can hire out if there are people who can’t go out.
Common for people to have a new mobile phone or tablet etc. that they don’t know how to use- the manager of 02 in Clydebank volunteers and can come round to your home and talk you through how to use it for free.
Suzanne also has an idea for a project around John Browns – she has made a stained glass window of John Brown’s and would be interested to speak to everyone in the complexes and get everyone to share stories about John Browns - was such a big part of Clydebank’s history.
Could then be collated and put as a display on the wall and
taken from complex to complex.
Lee confirmed that want to cater for everyone as our complexes have a wide variety of people each with their own likes and dislikes. Due to have regular complex meetings and Suzanne will be invited along.
Jim advised that is was through the tenant priority budget that Mill road had requested a greenhouse 6 x 6, slabbing, raised flowerbeds and vinyl floor coverings for the buildings. This was approved and they have actually got funding for a bigger more robust 6 x 8 greenhouse as it was more cost effective.
Jane confirmed that the proposal forms are open to all tenants and will available again in April. Proposals get costed and discussed at public meetings and it is tenants who decide which proposals go ahead – need to be value for money. Proposal can be for any improvement to housing property or land - has to be an improvements that wouldn’t be completed as part of the capital programme or something we should already be doing as a landlord.
Jean advised that just got new tables and chairs at Melfort but also finding that at the front path, there is no lighting and it badly needs handrails. Jane thought things like that should be done through
repairs.
Lee advised there had recently been a meeting with the CID, police, Housing Managers, herself and Alex Wrens. At the meeting conducted a walk around of Willox park and visited tenants.
Dale from Police Scotland also went round a day with the Supervisor, put himself into the shoes of a bogus caller to see what they would be able to see and made suggestions to improve security.
They had stickers to go on the back of people’s doors to remind them about cold callers and seeing identification.
There was a bit too much information on these and they are going to re-design these. Can’t stamp out these crimes unfortunately but can keep reminding people of the precautions they can take.
If you are not expecting someone at the door you are within your rights to not let them in - it’s not being rude - you are within your rights to send someone away if they do not have identification. If someone turns up and they are above board they will be more than happy to let you check their credentials before you let them in.
Between Dale and his team they are going to be going round all of the complexes. He wasn’t able to come to today’s meeting but should hopefully be at a future one. Jane advised that Housing Manager Edward Thomas was getting other complexes assessed to see if they would benefit from CCTV – Willox layout very unique as all have individual entrances so CCTV can be effective.
Mary asked who would maintain and monitor the CCTV and Jane confirmed the council already has a contract and it will be added to that.
Cycling without Age
Need a constituted group to apply for funding so following Sheltered Forum in Nov.
Approached the West Dunbartonshire Tenants & Residents Organisation who are the umbrella group for all Tenant groups within West Dunbartonshire. They are interested but are keen to meet with Christine Bell so she is going to their next meeting on 14/3/17 . If that goes well we can register as interested and then start applying for funding.
Rent setting consultation
Outcome from the tenant survey was for the 2% option so that is the option the Councillors agreed to. There were fewer tenants voting this year which was disappointing so we need to see how we
can get more tenants involved in the decision. There will be an article in the next Housing News but will also receive an individual letter stating your specific rent increase and comments made by the Forum and other tenant groups last year been taken into account so letter will hopefully be clear to understand.
Care Inspectorate - had an inspection from the Care Inspectorate in December. Daniel from the Care Inspectorate inspected Manse Gardens and Melfort Avenue. Delighted to announce that we managed to get an award of two 5’s. Daniel was very impressed and focus is now to keep up this high standard.
Lee also advised that been doing some work with the Leisure Services - Sport something she very interested in and wants Forum members to give her feedback to see what types of exercise activities each complex would like.
Leisure services have trained staff who will come to each complex – can provide a range of activities - walking football, which is football but you walk and fitbaw where you stand in the same place but do light exercises with your feet and a heavier ball.
Either way it would be more than what you would normally do. It needs to be appropriate to our tenants but if you enjoy something you need to spread the word, bring a neighbour with you for it to be a success.
Aiming to have a fitness programme by the summer. Some complexes already have some activities e.g. Manse do movement to music every weekend.
Hogan Court have exercise equipment in the complex but doesn’t get used.
Margaret advised that there are also local groups that do walkabouts in town where you get together and people chat and go for a walk.
Re-Structure – Lee advised have a re-structure going on - needed to change the structure to support the Sheltered Housing Service properly. Natalie is now full time rather than part time. Natalie will be more visible in the complexes and split between Dumbarton and Clydebank.
Alex Wrens will also be back. He will be managing the buildings, safety and maintenance . Lee will remain focused on the staff and tenants and the additional support has meant she will stay in post but reduce to 4 days a week.
John - alarm system at own property goes off 3 times per night between 3 and 4 am . James advised that similar experience at Mill road. Lee confirmed there was an ongoing issue with ‘ghost calls’ and that Alex was looking at getting the system upgraded.
Cathy advised she had a list of items of repairs about Young Street and Lee to pass on her Housing Officer, Brian Kerr’s details for her to speak to him.
Lee confirmed are working closely with Housing – current example would be working together to make sure that all tenants have working carbon monoxide detectors in their properties.
Angus asked if there is any chance of the complexes getting wifi? Lee advised Richard is looking into this and will get an update.
James asked if the doors in the complexes are fireproof?
Lee advised to speak to Jackie Baxter the housing officer and she should be able to confirm – will be building regulations that cover this.
John asked for an update on position with backshift at Hogan and Lee advised been staff using up holidays so they don’t lose them - some weekend staff able to pick up extra shifts so will see what can get covered.
Housing officers information will also be included in future newsletters so people know who and how to contact them.
Housing Officers should be having surgeries in the complexes and this would help resolve issues locally .
Jean asked if homecare supply carers with overshoes particularly when weather bad? Lee thought they used to but can take the idea back and see if it is something that could be accommodated.
15 May at Melfort Avenue sheltered complex in
Clydebank.