Homelessness charity launches urgent van appeal
HELP NEEDED: The Emmaus Hull & East Riding team with its broken vans
By Rick Lyon, Co-Editor
Homelessness charity Emmaus Hull & East Riding has launched an urgent appeal for help to replace the vans used for its homeless outreach service.
Emmaus Hull & East Riding provides a home, training, work opportunities and individual support to people who have experienced homelessness. In addition to its residential community, the charity also delivers an outreach service, providing direct support to people who are street homeless.
Stephanie Cooper, director of Emmaus Hull & East Riding, said: “Over the past few weeks, we’ve had two lots of bad news, with both of our old Emmaus outreach vans now broken beyond repair. The vans are essential to our service as they cover many miles each day, enabling our outreach support team to reach and help people who are homeless and sleeping rough across the East Riding.”
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“We have launched an urgent fundraising appeal but are also open to any help, either in the interim, or in finding permanent replacements. Our outreach team ideally need an MPV (multi-purpose vehicle), crew-van or combi-van and we’re appealing to individuals, local businesses, fleet hire companies or anyone with a spare van for help at this challenging time.”
Emmaus Hull & East Riding’s outreach team includes trained support workers, local volunteers and people with lived experience of homelessness. The team often starts work at 5am to meet people who are street homeless and provide friendly advice, items, signposting and access to further support.
The Emmaus outreach team had started a year-long, 500-mile walking challenge to raise funds to put towards replacing one of their vans. However, not long after launching the fundraising challenge, both vans experienced serious mechanical issues with the costs of repair much more than the charity can currently afford.
To find out more and support Emmaus Hull & East Riding’s appeal, visit: https://emmaus.org.uk/hull/outreach-van-appeal/
