We aim to support financially struggling members of our community by providing care packages. We are Tillydrone Community Council and we are dedicated to supporting those most at risk within our community. This includes elderly residents in sheltered housing, families with children who are living on a low income, and individuals who live alone. Tillydrone has been identified by the Scottish government as one of the top 10-20% most deprived areas in Scotland (SMID). Our aim is to provide as much support to our residents as we possibly can. We regularly engage with our community through social media and we have conducted online surveys to gauge community sentiments. Additionally, we are collaborating with other community groups to determine the best ways to provide care packages. Many individuals are struggling to afford food, cleaning supplies, and personal care products. Our goal is to supply these essentials in care packages for those most in need within our community.

To cover the costs of providing Christmas lights on the lamposts of Provost Watt Drive in Kincorth and to purchase beverages/snacks for our residents in the community to attend an event at Christmas to celebrate the switch-on of the lights. Over the years the Kincorth & Leggart Community Council have purchased Christmas Lights and now own a total of 18 individual lights. We would like to purchase a further 3 lights. The cost of one light is £195 and each lamppost must have a 16-amp socket installed on the lamppost to support the light at a cost of £85. We commission Scotia Animation Ltd to look after the lights on our behalf. This covers storage, maintenance, repair and erection of the lights at Christmas. Scotia also help KLCC with the submission of documentation to ACC for approval to instal the lights. The annual Invoice from Scotia for their services is approximately £1,500 depending on repairs etc. We spent £132 on beverages/snacks for the Christmas event which was held on 2nd December 2024 to celebrate last year’s lights switch-on. This event really brings the community together.  Including isolated people from all backgrounds

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The Peep service would like funding to deliver the Peep TALK programme in Kincorth. This is a free group for families with young children (aged 0-5 years) and differs from our traditional Peep groups with the focus being on supporting families to support their young children’s speech, language, and communication. Since Covid, there has been an increase of referrals to NHS Speech and Language services and the waiting lists to receive support are extremely long. The Peep TALK programme, co- written by a speech and language therapist, would alleviate some of the need for the NHS speech and language services and/or provide families support while they are on the waiting list. The Peep TALK sessions will include singing, sharing stories, play activities, and opportunities for families to socialise all while supporting their children’s development of speech and language.

One in five people live below the poverty line and with the rising cost of living crisis, many more people are finding themselves struggling to pay bills including putting food on the table. The Aberdeen North Foodbank is one of 428 Trussell foodbanks across the UK, providing 3 day, nutritionally balanced food parcels for those in need as well as providing a friendly face, a listening ear and practical support. In 2024, our foodbank was extremely busy, provided more than 50,000 meals to 11,000 people in crisis and unfortunately, we expect these numbers to be similar in 2025. Our costs to run the foodbank are also rising, and whilst we have support from The Trussell Trust and local supermarkets, we still have to find around £30,000 per year to pay for additional food needs, warehouse costs, staffing and for running a van to transport supplies to both our foodbanks. Most of this comes from grants, appeals and donations of both food and money and we are incredibly lucky to have a group of very dedicated volunteers, who help us to run our food warehouse and the two foodbanks in central Aberdeen. No-one should be hungry and without food. Support from Central U Decide, will ensure that we can support families and individuals most in need in 2025.

We are delighted to be welcoming more children's groups into the garden this year, including Tullos Primary children, Geronimo,and hopefully a group of local childminders and their young charges.  We want to enhance the garden to make it appealing to the children , part of these plans include replacing the old worn council fence with a wooden fence which will have marbles embedded in it to act as sun catchers.  The children would also have the opportunity to help paint and do pictures on the fence.

We also have our easter event coming up so would really appreciate some funding towards covering the costs of lunch, seeds, pots and childrens craft materials, ensuring that we can continue to provide all of this free of charge,  Finally we are excited to have a local artist come in, along with CIFINES HOPE team clients, and local volunteers, to paint a new nature themed mural to join the existing one on the depot wall.  To do this we need to buy a large amount of paint, brushes and paint trays.  We know that our visitors enjoy our existing mural, and hope that a new one can be enjoyed by all visitors ,regular and new,

We plan to set up the centre ar least one morning a week to offer soup and a roll in a warm and friendly safe space with no cost to entry.  All our volunteers will have been trained in the rquirements of food hygiene (L2) legislation and will have PVG accreditation.  We will be building up a pool of volunteers and team leaders to ensure that we have a sustainable rota built in for ensuring local continuity once the project starts.  We will also be looking to collaborate with Lochside Academy and other community partners in the management and delivery of this project to assist young people gain experience in the running a model of a social enterprise community cafe with an offfer of friendship and hot soup and a roll, acommpanied by a welcome cuppie.  We will endeavour to source quality produce from CFINE, supermarkets and other suppliers at no cost wherever possible, and where needed we will seek external funding to support our operational costs.  We have also set aside a reserve within our business planning for operational costs to ensure we can achieve our charitable purposes and meet an un-met local need in Torry.