Seaford Volunteer Emergency Team

WHAT AN ACHiEVEMENT! By SEAFoRD VoLUNTEER EMERGENCy TEAM (SVET)

We’re overwhelmed and delighted to have been awarded the Mayor’s Award for Health and Well Being 2020/1. This is an award and achievement for each and every volunteer who helped set up the service, kept it going and helped our community in so many ways. Congratulations and well done to you all!

As many of you will know, Seaford Volunteer Emergency Team was rapidly set up in March 2020 in response to the COVID crisis and Lockdown. The service provided a telephone helpline to connect our vulnerable residents with volunteers who could help with shopping and prescriptions. Although we must confess to helping with a few other different calls for support, which we rose to the challenge on.

This team involved over 200 volunteers and a network of community support pulling together for a common aim. From individual members of the community, through to the Rotary clubs, Town and District Councils, and local Churches who provided physical or financial support. What we have achieved for our lovely town of Seaford would not have been possible without all of you who stood up, stepped out or stayed at home to protect the health and well being of the town during the COVID lockdowns. THANK YOU ALL.

As we’ve been wrapping things up, we’ve reflected on the achievements made between March and December 2020: l Created a team of over 200 volunteers. l Provided volunteers with PPE. l 11,000 leaflets delivered to every household in the

Seaford area. l Set up and manned a telephone helpline. l Set up a bespoke database system to enable more efficient despatch of tasks. l Completed more than 2,808 total tasks (averaging approximately 10 tasks per day, for every day of activity). l Implemented a team structure and management committee with governance and policies in place. l Continually refined/revised our service as the situation kept changing. l Became members of the National Council

for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) to support our activities. l Left a legacy in place for the volunteer team structure, framework and resources for the future.

We’re also very proud of how our town set up more services to handle people’s needs, and we used the service to help promote these and enable our callers to become more confident, independent and selfsufficient. When we were confident we were no longer needed, we closed the helpline from 1st January 2021, keeping a watchful eye over the most recent lockdown.

Since this time, we’ve wound up our service, sorted our admin and put our finances in check. Any remaining funds received from individual donations on our GoFundMe campaign have been retained alongside some other resources, and our team governance, in readiness for a future emergency/purpose. All this infrastructure will enable us to jump into action again quickly should the need arise. Although, of course, we all hope that this is not needed for some time!

We’ll continue to keep our Facebook page active. We’d like to keep in contact with our network of volunteers and supporters, and continue to provide our community with useful information.

The motto of Seaford is often quoted as ‘In the Wind Strength’, yet the essence of that strength is in the town’s community. As we all look back on what’s been achieved together this has been a vibrant, energetic, passionate, and caring team from the very start, working together, using each other’s individual strengths and skills. It ends in a greater sense of community and stronger friendships. The measure of what’s achieved is in the voices and words of those we helped and those who volunteered.

To everyone who came together and supported this great team effort – no matter how big or small – we thank you and hope you’re as proud as us in what we were able to do for our great town.

Sarah McStravick (SVET Chair) and the rest of the SVET Team.

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