BCAN (Bristol Christian
Action Network) Helping Christians Respond To Social Needs Bristol Homeless Forum
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BackgroundBCAN has been operating in Bristol for some years, and undertakes a range of activities. One of these activities has been the establishment of a Homeless Forum. The BCAN Homeless Forum (‘BHF’) started as an experiment: people were invited to a single meeting, and decided that it would be helpful to continue to learn from each other and explore ways in which we can work with each other more effectively. Since the initial meeting in September 2001, the BHF has met every two months. Homelessness is one of a complex set of inter-related problems. Those who are, or who have been, homeless often also suffer from addiction, debt, unemployment, physical and mental health issues; they often suffer from a history of abuse and family breakup and engage in criminal behaviour. Most of the professionals are only able to address one part of this complex mixture, and while in theory they are supposed to work together, in practice this rarely happens. So it is often the 'amateurs' - the smaller charities and voluntary groups - who work with these people in a holistic way. For many of these groups, the BCAN Homeless Forum is the only real support they receive. For more information about our purpose and activities, please see the Introduction page. Public LaunchThe BCAN Homeless Forum organised a public launch on 15 April 2005 to promote its work. Please see the Public Launch page for more details. TrainingOne practical way we support each other is by sharing the training we all need. The training sessions are usually on the second Saturday morning and the second Wednesday evening of each month. Please see the training page for more details. The training is open to anyone who would benefit, and does not require any previous knowledge or experience. MeetingsThe BCAN Homeless Forum meets every two months, on the second Thursday of the month. Please see the Calendar page for more details of the meeting dates and venues. Please go to the Meetings page for more details of the meetings, and to find copies of the agendas and meeting notes. The other BHF documents can be found on the Documents page. Email ListThe BCAN Homeless Forum maintains a mailing list. The purpose of this mailing list is to enable BHF members to distribute news relevant to our activities. The software currently being used to maintain this mailing list is 'majordomo'. At present, Paul Hazelden is 'hosting' the mailing list, which is why subscribe and unsubscribe requests are sent to "majordomo@hazelden.org.uk" and not (for example) "majordomo@bcan.org.uk". If you wish to add yourself to the list, please send a Plain Text email to "majordomo@hazelden.org.uk" and put "subscribe bhf" as the message BODY - the message SUBJECT will be ignored. Please send your email in Plain Text format only: if your email application sends messages in HTML format by default, you should change the setting to Plain Text for this message. You can remove yourself from the list in the same way: simply send a Plain Text email to "majordomo@hazelden.org.uk" and put "unsubscribe bhf" as the message BODY. The message SUBJECT will again be ignored. For further information about the BCAN Homeless Forum, please send a message to Paul Hazelden. Thank you . |
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