Member Article

Community centre is more accessible

Local builders help make Community Centre more accessible

The Springhead Community Centre is used by a wide range of local groups and has around 400 people coming through its doors every week. Although it has been slowly refurbished by Springhead Community Association (SCA) there was one area in particular that was in need of a much needed facelift.

Barbara Beeley from SCA said: “There is no getting away for the fact that our disabled access toilet was just grotty and we were desperate to find somebody to help bring it up to scratch. We knew that local builder Emanuel Whittaker was working in the area for First Choice Homes Oldham and so we decided to ask them if they could help.’

Where possible Emanuel Whittaker is committed to working with and assisting local community ventures in the areas they work, and Mark Coyle, Site Manager believed the Community Centre was a very worthy cause.

’Having seen the state of the toilet for ourselves we were keen to help,“ said Mark. ’However, we needed the assistance of our sub-contractors and many of them generously gave either time or materials to complete the project and it was a real team effort that made the project possible.“

Emanuel Whittaker supplied all the materials – tiles, timber and floor coverings and the labour needed to fix a new timber ceiling grid, box and frame out all the walls to allow the sanitary ware to be fitted. It also cleaned and finished the works. Druggitt & Harding provided all the disabled access sanitary goods and carried out all the necessary plumbing, while Bladen Electrical supplied a new electric hand washer, light fittings, a fan, and carried out all the associated electrical works.

Langam Plasterers provided the supplies and labour necessary to fully replaster the walls and ceilings and HR Decorators provided the materials and and labour to re-decorate the room, while LW Ceramics provided the labour to tile the walls. Finally, SGH Flooring provided the labour necessary to screed and install new vinyl sheet flooring.

Barbara said: “We are so grateful to all the craftsmen who helped to transform our toilet into the best room in the building. They did a magnificent job with the minimum of disruption to the life of the Centre. This has made a huge improvement to the Centre which is managed by local community volunteers and funded by the groups that use it.”

The Community Centre is home to various groups including a playgroup, table tennis, line dancing, arts, karate group, whist, Slimming World, Chadderton Riffle and Pistol Club and also offers a pottery annex, IT suite, library corner and kitchen.

The refurbishment of the disabled toilet has now made a significant difference to the facilities offered to disabled users of the Centre.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Emanuel Whittaker .