A Hereford charity is aiming to raise a million pounds to fund a new centre in the city to house families at risk of homelessness.

Vennture secured planning permission at the third attempt a year ago to convert the Victorian former vicarage beside its Vicarage Road headquarters southeast of the city centre.

This is to provide emergency accommodation for up to ten weeks at a time for at least 25 families a year, including 60 children, while the charity helps them address the root causes of their homelessness.

RELATED NEWS:

Vennture’s lead executive Robert Thomas said there was a need to address “the chronic local shortage of suitable emergency accommodation for families facing homelessness” in the county.

Herefordshire Council said that in the year to the start of April it had housed 447 households at risk of homelessness, of which 350 were in hotels or B&Bs, at a cost of over £3 million.

What are your thoughts?

You can send a letter to the editor to have your say by clicking here.

Letters should not exceed 250 words and local issues take precedence.

“We are aware of more than 70 families and 130 children spending long periods in undersized, ill-equipped, often insecure hotel rooms with little or no support,” Mr Thomas added.

Vennture is appealing to local businesses and individuals to help raise the funds needed.

OTHER NEWS:

High Sheriff of Herefordshire Patricia Churchward has backed the bid, saying: “I do hope local people and the business community will do what they can to help fundraise and, as a community, we can make this happen.”

She added: “Homelessness can affect anyone, including hard-working, respectable families who are overtaken by job loss, relationship breakdown, debilitating illness, bereavement and more recently, the cost-of-living crisis.”

Herefordshire Council meanwhile says it aims to buy 15 local properties in the current financial year specifically for young people at risk of homelessness, with the help of a £1.4 million government grant.