We are always looking for Volunteers…

Celebrate festival – Getting involved

Hello All 

The Celebrate festival organisers are requesting volunteers to help with this year’s event on June 8th at Manley Park – with the theme ‘Crossing Oceans’

If anyone is interested in getting involved, this could be in a range of ways:

– volunteering on the day e.g. a spell on the gate, volunteers food etc

– help with set up and take down

– provide prizes/vouchers for the raffle

– join the planning group

Please contact Carol – email carol.packham96@gmail.com –  if you would like to volunteer.

Thanks in advance 

Also – if anyone is interested in hosting a community stall to promote your local group or pay a small fee to run a stall selling craft items etc – contact Verity –  the Celebrate Coordinator – at celebratewhalleyrange@gmail.com

Whalley Range Community Forum and Whalley Range Youth Opportunity Association invite you to join them at

Celebrate Festival 2024 ‘Crossing Oceans’

Saturday 8^th June 12 noon – 6pm

Manley Park, Clarendon Rd, Whalley Range, M16 0AS

June 8^th is UN Day of Oceans and our theme this year is ‘Crossing Oceans’, celebrating the diversity of Whalley Range and exploring wider climate issues. We look forward to seeing how our artists, performers and stall holders explore these ideas.

This is the 27^th Celebrate Festival and our principles remain the same.

We bring together a wide range of community partners in Whalley Range to put on an exciting day of free activities celebrating the very best of our fantastic community, with a focus on fun, creativity and wellbeing, but also looking at serious issues.  In the run up to the event we run workshops and pop up events in schools and a wide range of community settings.

The festival is run by volunteers from the community and staff from WRCF and WRYOA, working with partners from other local groups, businesses, schools and statutory services. However we are grateful for the professional assistance of our project coordinators and artists.

Our Festival Coordinator this year is Verity Gardner and our Music Programmers are Chia Norris and Ben Price.

The festival is made possible by donations from individuals and local businesses, fundraising by volunteers and grants from funders including National Lottery Awards for All and Manchester City Council.

The Aims of Celebrate:

• To celebrate the talent, diversity and resources of Whalley Range
• To promote positive image and improve quality of life in Whalley Range
• To encourage participation of different communities within the area and work from an anti-discriminatory framework.

If you want to get involved with Celebrate contact us at: celebratewhalleyrange@gmail.com or call 0161 881 3744

WATCH THIS SPACE FOR MORE DETAILS AND THE CELEBRATE PROGRAMME – COMING SOON…

CELEBRATE FESTIVAL REPORT 2023

Scroll down further for the history of Celebrate…

The Celebrate festival 2023

Contact celebratewhalleyrange@gmail.com to get involved 

The aims of the group are to:-

– Celebrate the talent, diversity and resources of Whalley Range

– Promote a positive image of the area and improve the quality of life

– Encourage participation of the different communities within the area,

– Work in an anti-discriminatory and inclusive way (i.e. be low cost and barrier free).

The event is held in partnership between Whalley Range Youth Opportunities Association and the Whalley Range Community Forum.

We are committed to working with  everyone in the community – especially newly established groups who have been supported to develop by the Forum and that all groups are represented to celebrate our diversity and showcase our local talent, building and maintaining links across the community.

We strive to challenge any negative perceptions people may have with regard to Whalley Range by encouraging active cross cultural community involvement in our age-friendly festival events, workshops and activities,strengthening community cohesion and encouraging participation from residents from all of the diverse cultures that exist within our ward.

A consultation was circulated about Celebrate: some of the responses are below.

Q1: How does the Celebrate Festival bring the Whalley Range community together?

Q2: Why is an event that brings members of a very diverse community together important?

• An event which caters for all ages, young, old and in-between! One that has activities that are attractive to a wide range of cultures and interest groups.
• Something for everybody. One of the highlights of the Whalley Range year.
• Whalley Range has a diverse society, lots of religions and cultures and Celebrate Festival reflects this.
• it brings rich, poor, middle-class, working-class, young and old together and those from other ethnic minorities besides English.
• This is an opportunity for the vast number of small voluntary and community groups to showcase what they are involved in and promote their activities.
• It a chance for neighbours to get together in an informal way. With so many people leading busy lives, it really wonderful to see everyone from across the community in the same place enjoying the activities, information sharing and each other company.
• Community cohesion and integration must be encouraged to avoid people feeling isolated, abandoned and rejected. Events like this promote community cohesion.
• In diverse communities like Whalley Range it is often not the case that people from the diverse range all get along. Often the different groups are isolated from each other and never really mix. Events like this are a good way to get people from the wide range of groups to talk to each other and share commonalities as well as celebrate difference.
• It inclusive, everyone has a chance to get involved and it a chance to participate in free workshops
• Because we are all human beings and Celebrate brings human beings regardless of their shape or colour together to have fun and learn. In full: www.whalleyrange.org/communityforum/celebrate-survey-what-did-people-say-about-the-festival/

Celebrate is an ideal platform for local community groups to host a stall to promote themselves and get people involved in having a say in their community

Celebrate Report 2011

Celebrate_Report 2012_CR

Celebrate_Report 2013FINAL

Celebrate_Festival_Report 2015

http://wryoa.org/category/celebrate/

https://www.facebook.com/pg/CelebrateFestivalWhalleyRange/about/?ref=page_internal

Read the latest Celebrate Report from 2018 here:

 CELEBRATE REPORT 2018 FINAL SMALL (1)

The Celebrate Festival 2018

Celebrate 2018 in pictures!

A short video capture and photos of the Whalley Range Celebrate Festival by Andrew Thompson

Filmed by Andrew Thompson Celebrate 2017 snapshot¦Read More…

Details of planned tree work in Whalley Range.

The list includes locations of the tree, reason why work is required and a summary of the planned work.

Whalley Range tree work (1)

This Directory aims to reflect the wide range of work and activities carried out locally.

The Directory features Age-friendly information and work delivered in Whalley Range, Chorlton and Chorlton Park to support Manchester City Council’s Age Friendly Programme.

FINAL Spring Summer AGe Friendly Brochure WR and C

Whalley Range Climate Action Group 

Everyone welcome to come along to discuss the climate emergency with other concerned people and get involved in actions to make Whalley Range a more sustainable place to live.  We meet on the 3rd Saturday of the month and eat a  vegetarian/vegan lunch together after the meeting. Bring a little  food to share if you can at the JNR8 Youth & Community Centre, 82 Cromwell Ave, M16 0BG

Local people and organisations taking action to address
the climate emergency.
climateaction@whalleyrangers.org
@RangeAction
Facebook: Whalley Range Climate Action
Group
Judith – 07792 690 278

See the Whalley Range Climate Action Group’s leaflet below on keeping warm, saving energy, and getting financial help for insulation and bills…

PDF  leaflet:    leaflet_A4_pgs1_2 leaflet_A4_pgs3_4

Click here for the June 2022 issue of the Whalley Range Climate Action Newsletter

NEWSLETTER June 22

 

March 2022

Local community groups and residents creating a MASS PLANTING OF SNOWDROPS in Alexandra Park Whalley Range Manchester yesterday.

We worked on this together because we want to COMMEMORATE THOSE WHO SUFFERED FROM COVID AND THOSE WHO LOST THEIR LIVES, as well as the hard work of all those who cared for us during the pandemic. Planting snowdrops will CONNECT ALL OUR COMMUNITIES IN A COLLABORATIVE MEMORIAL to CREATE A CONTEMPLATIVE SPACE for us to remember the suffering and pain of loss every year.

Why Snowdrops?

Newsletter May 21

May 2020 Update

Read the groups 1st edition Newsletter here:

WHALLEY RANGE CLIMATE ACTION GROUP NEWSLETTER final

Whalley Range Climate Action Plan 
Introduction 2
Our current emissions 2
General information about Whalley Range 3
Average carbon footprint of a UK resident 6
Strategies for carbon reduction in Whalley Range 9
Existing organisations, social networks and projects 10
Sources 15

Read in full below:

Whalley Range Climate Action Plan

_________________________________________________________

Whalley Range Climate Action Group upcoming meetings:

The Whalley Range Climate Action Group meet at  JNR8 Community Centre (back of Manley Park Church)

_____________________________________________________________

The Whalley Range Community Forum have produced the Whalley Range Community Forum Climate Emergency Statement and Strategies working document.
Read it here: WRCF Climate Emergency Policy and Strategies November 2019

_______________________________________________________________

Notes from the meeting on Sat 7 September from 11-1pm:

Blog for steady State Manchester on Whalley Range Climate action Group (WRCAG)

Climate change is a tricky subject. Some people deny it, are ignorant about it or think it is nothing to do with them. On the other hand, many are terrified by what a globally heated world will hold for them, their children and for the future of millions of our fellow humans. The Guardian newspaper suggests we intensify the very language we use with phrases like climate emergency, climate crisis and global heating instead of climate change and global warming.

However, both denial and terror risk confining us to a similar, paralysed, state of inaction, so that nothing changes. What are the paths out of this immobilisation?

A tiny group of residents in Whalley Range got talking about climate change. While we fully support the national and international actions of Extinction Rebellion/Friends of the Earth/Climate Justice and all the other efforts being made to promote real change, the phrase  Thinking globally and acting locally also spurred us to think about what we can do right now, right here, in our own locality of Whalley Range.

We started locally and small, using word of mouth to find fellowship, trying to remain humble and open to ideas. The group grew in size steadily and we now have dozens of interested parties. Initially, I thought we would be a kind of retrofit support group, trying to help each other get properly insulated, reduce our energy usage, become car free and work out better ways to have flight free holidays. It has become a lot more than that.

Conversation triggered us to act, and we began by extending those conversations into our community. We listened to each other and to the residents we met at our simple stalls at community events. In no time we had a presence at Celebrate, (an annual local festival), at Ecofest, an event run by a local church, at the Windrush event in a local park We joined in an inspiring Clean Air Day action, when streets were closed around schools to enable pollution free walking and most joyously of all free street play for the children. The sounds of birdsong, children playing and people chatting rose out of the car free silence.

What used to be taken for granted, safe walking and children playing out, has become a privilege, that took a huge amount of organisation and preparation to bring about and lasted for less than half a day. This has also reinforced the value of the kinds of conversations we are aiming to have. We do not instruct, but rather, ask Where are you up to with the climate change thing? and What would make Whalley Range a climate safe, buzzing, good place to live?

These discussions were interesting, challenging and produced actionable ideas about what is important here in our own community. Many people in Whalley Range are thinking about climate change, environmental degradation and pollution. They are fed up with the noise, danger and pollution from cars and the limiting effects this has. They feel the constraints: unsafe walking especially for children, asthma increased by pollution, litter everywhere. People were outraged by the plastics they feel they cannot escape, wrapped around everything, all the time. We found much common cause with many other local organisations such as the Whalley Rangers and local wildlife support groups. Many organisations whose prime purpose is not about climate change, for example, Age Friendly Manchester or the local Park support and Heritage groups, joined us in thinking that climate change is their business too and that they can act here in Whalley Range.

 It has been exciting to hear these perspectives, to take the street on Clean Air Day, and to discover that residents are willing to discuss these issues. It has made me a little braver to speak about climate change. This week, my lovely neighbour was in the street with two young relatives showing off their new cars. The cars were idling in the street, doors open, he showed me the clever seats. We had met on many occasions, so I felt able to turn the ignition key off and say idling cars are not good for us. I had the same conversation with the man sweeping the street who left his vehicle idling for 30 minutes while he had his lunch break.

Our next meetings will be opportunities to reflect on what we have heard, what our priorities are and to decide what our main actions should be. We think it is likely that not everyone in the group will want to work on the same things. Some will be interested in schools, educating parents and pupils, others in taking the streets away from cars, others in building consensus against plastics in supermarkets, schools and our shopping bags. Connecting with other organisations that work in our area including the National Health Services has been highlighted as a way to make our work more effective locally.

WRACG does not have a manifesto; our first leaflet simply explains who we are local residents working on what we can do about climate change, with a simple list of suggestions to help anyone reduce their impact on the planet. Reducing energy use, going flight free, consuming less, walking, cycling and using public transport, eating a mainly vegetarian diet are all important actions. Having a group of like-minded people around empowers us, to tell others what we are doing and to explore ways we can reduce our carbon emissions.

Another key action is to make our voices heard on this issue, wherever possible, in whichever organisations we are in contact with. Building connections between people will make Whalley Range an Abundant Community, where we know and value our neighbours through shared events and conversations. Then we will have a good life that is also a climate friendly life, here and now.

Massive policy change is needed, for sure, and governments must lead on the bigger changes. But if 10% of people get behind the need to reduce emissions drastically, that a massive opinion former and a strong message to local and central government, that will be hard to ignore. In the 18^th century, rich landowners planted trees that they know they would never see to maturity but which are still enjoyed by many of us today. We can take a leaf out of their book and start planning for our descendants instead of just thinking about today and this week.

 WRCAG has only been active for a few short months. We will continue to reach out to all the members of our community…different ethnicities, religions, ages, interests. Climate change will damage all of us…we need to work for change together, here, where we live.

Welcome to the third edition of the Whalley Range Community Forum Map – with an emphasis on physical and mental health and wellbeing and climate change.

This map was produced by the Whalley Range Community Forum at JNR8 and was part-funded by buzz Manchester Wellbeing Service.

New 2 page MAP A3_v4 (4)

About this map: its history and previous versions…

In Spring 2011 local people voted yes to the idea of a map to celebrate the unique place that is Whalley Range.

A U Decide grant was awarded and, along with generous contributions from local sponsors and volunteers, the map has come to life.

The 2nd Edition features the regeneration of Alexandra Park along with updated listings, new history items and more.

wr_dec13_map_small

Community Contact Booklet Whalley Range Community Forum_interactive

The Winter Warm Welcome Spaces website has been updated and relaunched so you can search for local spaces.

Find our JNR8 Community Warm Hub details here:

We will share information from support agencies and community groups regularly on this page.

1. News & Events
2. Advice Line
3. Whalley Range Climate Action Group advice
4. Whalley Range Community Forum Cost of Living support leaflet
5. Benefits, protecting your health
6. Easy Read winter health advice
7. Warm Hubs
8. Other advice

Council support if you’re in financial difficulty

https://www.manchester.gov.uk/info/200008/benefits_and_support/8335/discretionary_payments_and_grants 

LOW-COST RECIPE BOOK IS HERE This Easter, we can announce a free low-cost recipe book we have developed in collaboration with local NHS nutritionist Lucy Blackstone. Over the Easter holidays, we will be distributing over 20,000 copies to families in need across Manchester. We believe that no child should go hungry. We believe in widening access not only to activity, but to the knowledge of healthy eating and nutritious cooking for Mancunians young and old. With this recipe book, we hope to do just that. Eating well doesn’t have to break the bank, by sharing simple and affordable recipes, we can help families stretch their budgets further. Ensuring that everyone in Manchester has access to delicious and nutritious food, helping you become healthier and happier. View and download your copy of the book here.

To support Manchester residents through the cost-of-living crisis, Manchester City Council will be providing an advice line that will offer:

1. Support with benefits and help with your rent (this is an existing offer made available through the contact centre)

2. Advice about debt and paying bills (this will be done in conjunction with Citizen Advice Manchester)

3. Food support (residents will receive a call back to understand their needs and connected into a local food offer)
4. Support getting online (residents will be linked in with the Council’s digital inclusion team)

How to contact

The advice line can be accessed via a free phone number 0800 023 2692. The line will be open 9:00-4:30 Monday to Friday.

Agents on the phone line will have access to language line for those residents whose first language is not English
Sign Video will also be available for residents who may require this facility.

An on line form will be available at https://www.manchester.gov.uk/helpinghands for those who do not
wish to contact by phone.

The advice line will also have its own web page that will have links to information of how residents are
able to access support. https://www.manchester.gov.uk/helpinghands

Whalley Range Climate Action Group  energy saving information

PDF:    leaflet_A4_pgs1_2 leaflet_A4_pgs3_4

PDF Version (clearer with clickable links) WRCF Cost of Living leaflet Print

Easy Read format Winter Vaccination and Cost of Living advice 

Winter Help Leaflet v4

Warm spaces are opening up across the city: a place to keep warm and save on energy costs, a place to get advice, a cuppa, spend time with others or enjoy some quiet time.

St Margaret’s Centre welcome you to their Warm Cafe every Thursday from 13th October-1pm-3pm, over the colder months.

Energy Price Guarantee 

From 1 October 2022, the Energy Price Guarantee will reduce the unit cost of electricity and gas so that a typical household in Great Britain pays, on average, around £2,500 a year on their energy bill, for the next 2 years. Beware of scams – there is no need to apply and you will never be asked for bank details.

This will save the average household at least £1,000 a year based on current energy prices from October and is in addition to the £400 energy bills discount for all households.

More information

Click the link or photo below to read this year’s Celebrate Festival report from June 2023…

CELEBRATE FESTIVAL REPORT 2023

The Snowdrop Curve film…

How did Covid affect you?  three events were organised earlier in the year for people to gather, discuss and write about their experiences through Covid…

Last year the Covid Commemorative Curve of Snowdrops was planted by people from Whalley Range, in Alexandra Park. The curve symbolises the ups and downs of the pandemic and the plants will make a green and living memorial, a place to reflect on the loss and pain that came with Covid.

This year we want to honour your experiences of living through Covid. We are organising gatherings where you can talk with others and share experiences. A local poet, Tony Curry, will work with you, to write and record your thoughts as poems.

Your words will be recorded and combined with songs performed by local schoolchildren to create a short film. The interpretation board QR code in the park will link to the film.

This will be a further commemoration of our responses to the Covid events.

GATHERINGS to talk and write; choose a date and time that works for you.

Tuesday 17^th January 1045 to 1300 at the Pavilion Café in Alexandra Park.

Tuesday 17^th January at 1715 to 1930 at British Muslim Heritage Centre, College Road M16

Thursday 19^th January 1045 to 1300 at the Pavilion Café in Alexandra Park.

Booking not essential, just come along on your chosen date.

On Feb 11^th 2023 at 11am come and see the curve of snowdrops in flower.

Tea and coffee will be served from the Park Lodge.

Celebrate programme-2023

There is still space left on our Willow Spinner and Singing workshops today (Wednesday 7/6/23)

Also spaces for our Thursday 8/6/23 Willow Spinner workshop and a workshop with Curious Crafty making Ojo De Dios with sticks and yarn…see posters below.

Please call or text to book – see number on posters 

Celebrate festival – Getting involved

Hello All 

Thanks in advance 

Also – if anyone is interested in hosting a community stall to promote your local group or pay a small fee to run a stall selling craft items etc – let me know and I’ll pass your details on to Lotte, the coordinator. 

Chris 

Please add this date to your diary!

June 10th 2023

Celebrate will be held at our base at the JNR8 Youth & Community Centre/Manley Park Church on June 10th 12-6pm – with lots going on inside and out!

More details coming soon – watch this space for news of our pre-festival workshops and details of our festival attractions and delights!

Age-friendly Whalley Range & Chorlton Annual Report 2022

Age Friendly Whalley Range and Chorlton Annual Report 2022

Whalley Range Community Forum Annual Report 2022

WRCF-Annual-Report-2023