Festive Event Highlights Monumental Year

Leeds Community Foundation rounded off what has been a milestone year with our Festive Celebration Event at Avenue HQ, supported by Barclay’s Eagle Labs.

The event provided guests with a flavour of just some of the impact the Foundation and the community groups it supports has made over the past year. Harmony Choir provided some excellent entertainment to get guests into the festive spirit.

Leeds Community Foundation Ambassador, Christine Talbot, presenter at ITV’s Calendar, hosted the event and highlighted that since its inception the foundation has distributed over £42m in grants – supporting hundreds of thousands of people across Leeds and Bradford.

Christine also spoke about our strategic priority: loneliness and inclusion. Loneliness affects over 37,000 in Leeds, and as Christine pointed out, can affect anyone from an older person mourning the loss of a life partner to a young person who simply feels different and isolated from their friends.

In 2018/2019: The Foundation distributed over £159,000 to seven Third Sector Organisations in the city tackling loneliness and isolation. One of which was Shantona, who support women who have been victims of domestic violence. Nahid Rasool, CEO of Shantona also spoke about the impact of their funded project, which allowed the women they support to get back into employment through a number of activities such as CV writing and work experience.

Thank you to Avenue HQ and Barclay’s Eagle Labs for supporting the event and thank you to our host Christine Talbot and guest speaker Nahid Rasool for highlighting the importance of Leeds Community Foundation funding to support those that need help the most.