Street outreach services for rough sleepers will be provided by Change Grow Live from 1 April.
The charity – which already provides a number of services in Brighton & Hove – will take over as our street outreach partner from St Mungo’s, whose contract ended on 31 March.
We are grateful to St Mungo’s for all the work they have done over the last six years to help rough sleepers, and all involved have worked to ensure a smooth transition to the new service.
There is no change in the way people contact the street outreach service. If you’re concerned about anyone sleeping rough in the city, please let us know by reporting through the Streetlink website or by calling 0300 500 0914.
Supporting people to move off the streets
The council funds the specialist outreach service to go out on the streets to help people sleeping rough.
The street outreach team works with all rough sleepers to offer support and help them into safe, secure accommodation. The service also links in with other agencies across the city to provide joined up personal support.
Support on offer during Covid has led to Brighton & Hove having the largest decrease of people sleeping rough in the country outside London.
A count carried out in November last year found 27 people sleeping rough in the city - a 69% decrease on figures for November 2019. We carry out a street count in the city every two months. The latest was on 28 January and found the figures had dropped further, with nine people sleeping out.
During this winter, as part of the Covid response, St Mungo’s worked in the city seven days a week. From 1 April street outreach work will go back to the standard service of six days a week.
The street outreach service was recommissioned from the date the existing contract ends following standard procedure and an open procurement process.
Change Grow Live
Vicky McFarlane, Brighton & Hove Mentor Coordinator at Change Grow Live, said: “Our street outreach team is looking forward to working across Brighton & Hove, as part of a city-wide effort to support the street homeless to find safe accommodation and accomplish their goals.
“Alongside this outreach service, Change Grow Live also provides drug and alcohol recovery services in Brighton & Hove, as well as a bespoke mentoring service for people who have become homeless or live in supported accommodation.
"The addition of a street outreach team will enable us to provide wrap-around support for some of the hardest-to-reach people living on the streets, offering individually tailored plans to tackle a variety of complex needs including homelessness, poor mental and physical health, and substance misuse issues.
“The support on offer to homeless people in Brighton & Hove during the pandemic has had a significant impact, reducing the number of people sleeping on the streets by two thirds.
"We look forward to working together with charities and organisations across Brighton & Hove to widen our reach further, so that we can actively prevent people falling into homelessness and support more people to find safe, affordable routes off the streets.”
Change Grow Live is a national charity whose mission is to help people change the direction of their lives, grow as individuals, and live life to its full potential.
Change Grow Live already operates several services in Brighton & Hove, including the substance misuse service, a residential drug treatment project, and a peer mentoring service
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