The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
Community hub moves to bigger home
An award-winning Angus community hub has embarked on a new era in a permanent base to support those living with dementia.
Since its formation in 2015, Kirrie Connections has pioneered a range of programmes to help people in the town and beyond.
Its successes include becoming Scotland’s first meeting centre based around a model developed in the Netherlands to tailor support to individuals and their families.
Based until last year in the former Angus Council Access office in Kirrie, it has now taken up residence in another town centre premises at The Roods, offering what officials say is space to grow the project and its ambitions.
Work on the new building is already under way in preparing it for the return of regular and new faces.
“This is a very significant step for us, with our own building which offers so much opportunity for what we want to do going forward,” said chief officer Graham Galloway.
The move has been aided by grant support of £8,650 from the Community Climate Action Fund and a further £15,000 from the Creating Better Lives in Tayside project run by the Life Changes Trust.
Mr Galloway added: “The space inside the building is much greater for all of our needs.
“And there is a significant area of ground outside beyond what car parking
we need, so we hope to develop part of that into a community garden.
“It will be a base for Kirrie Connections, but we want it to be more than that and are coming up with a lot of ideas.”
Since the first lockdown, the organisation has continued to support locals through regular Zoom meetings of the popular
memories and activities groups it has established.
And it continues to deliver more than 1,000 printed sheets of activities and information each week.
In a Leader-funded festive partnership project, Kirrie Connections sent out 40 individually-tailored wellbeing hampers and staged an online party to
help people stay connected.
Arlene Crockett, director of evidence and influencing for the dementia programme at the Life Changes Trust, hailed the group’s progress over the past five years.
She said: “They have been a beacon in the local community and we are pleased to be able to offer this support.”