Barrhead Housing Association elects new chairperson

The Association is pleased to announce the election of a new Chairperson, Rena McGuire at a recent meeting of the Management Committee. After 5 years in office, the out-going chairperson Claire Boyd is required to stand down. The Association would like to thank and acknowledge the hard work and support Claire has provided to the Association, to local housing associations through FLAIR and to the wider housing sector in her duties.

Rena comes with a wealthy of experience and local knowledge and has been involved with the Association for the last 10 years. Like all sectors, however, the Housing Association sector will face continuing change in the years ahead with welfare reform, the introduction of the Scottish Social housing charter, a new Scottish housing Regulator to name but a few. Of the appointment and the challenges ahead, Rena said: “I’d like to thank the Management Committee for their support. The Association has grown from strength to strength over recent years and I’m thoroughly looking forward to taking on the Chairperson’s role. I know Claire will be a hard act to follow. Times are very hard for people at the moment and the Association will continue with its commitment to improving the communities within East Renfrewshire.

Barrhead Housing Association Celebrating a Year of Success

Barrhead Housing Association has been working along with East Renfrewshire Council’s Young Persons Services and Social Work on a befriending project for young people locally. The first two young people and befrienders to be matched up through the programme have just completed a year of meeting together and the Association was pleased to hold a ceremony to present them all with a certificate in recognition of their work during that time. The pairs meet usually on a weekly basis and take part in activities together, giving the befrienders a chance to get to know the young people and provide support and a positive role model for them. The programme works through the commitment of the befrienders, young people and their families, and has been shown to have had a very positive effect on the behaviour of the young people involved.

Presentations were made by the new chair of Barrhead Housing Association, Rena McGuire.

If you are interested in finding out more about the programme, please contact Jim Munro on 0141 881 0638 or enquiries@barrheadha.org

Barrhead Housing Association Bronze Award for Investors in People

The Association is delighted to achieve the Bronze award for Investors in People accreditation following a successful re-assessment earlier this year. The independent assessor, who spent two days in the office interviewing staff and Committee members, highlights that following accreditation in 2008, the Association has gone on to make further improvements to the business, despite the wider economic and changing environment. The assessment recognised improvements in business efficiency, that the Association has the right staff skills to provide an excellent service, and that the Association is able to increase investment in stock and improve customer satisfaction. Of the recognition, the Association’s new chairperson Rena McGuire said: “This is an excellent achievement for the Association and the staff team who continue to strive for improvement in all areas. It acknowledges that the Association has continued over the last 6 years to work hard and for staff to get the recognition through IIP that is deserved”.

Barrhead Housing Association was delighted that a recent application to Radio Clyde’s Cash for Kids appeal brought joy for local children this Christmas. 57 local kids from Barrhead and Neilston received a gift to the value of £25 each, and many joined Association staff at the Auchenback Resource Centre last Thursday to receive their gift from Santa. The Association would like to wish all our local tenants and residents a Happy Christmas.

Barrhead Housing Association sponsor local team

The Association is delighted to have recently sponsored £500 for football strips for the Dunterlie football team. Formed from the Dunterlie area, there are now 17 boys who train and play three times a week; have a coach in place to keep them on their toes and recently joined a local football league. Most of the boys are teenagers and are totally committed to turning out on a Friday night and a Saturday morning to play with their teammates. Hopefully their new bright orange football strips will get them noticed and we will see some winning results. Good luck to the boys!

Barrhead Housing Association Winners at Annual General Meeting 

At a successful Annual General Meeting, Barrhead Housing Association Committee was delighted to award our tenants for the garden competition and for the John McIntyre Good Neighbour Award.   The annual good neighbour award this year went to tenant, William McKenzie who was nominated by his neighbour for helping out everyone within his block over a number of years. 

Budding gardening winners included overall winner Mrs. Fraser of Neilston, and area winners included Mrs. Carrol of Auchenback, Ms. Fulton of Dunterlie and Miss MacDonald of North Park, Barrhead. 

Congratulations to them all!

The awards were presented at the end of the AGM after members received a full report on the Association's activities from the Chairperson, Claire Boyd and Director, Shirley Robison. The Association's auditors, French Duncan, confirmed that the audit had gone well, and that a healthy surplus had been produced following a careful year of financial management. The AGM was held on 18th August. 2011 in Voluntary Action's Undercover building at the Westbourne Centre and was attended by 22 members and local Councillors Eddie Phillips and Ian McAlpine.

Barrhead HA achieves Gold Award for Healthy Working Lives

The Association's staff members have been working through the Healthy Working Lives initiative for the last 5 years and have successfully achieved the Bronze, Silver and now the Gold standard under this initiative.  Staff are delighted to add the Gold award to their collection.  Staff members have shown their determination and commitment to collectively making improvements to the health and well-being of each other through this initiative.  The organisation has also been committed to this initiative and has seen significant benefits in areas of motivation, productivity and attendance over the years.  Chairperson, Claire Boyd said: “I am delighted that our staff team has taken on this initiative with such enthusiasm and while the serious aspects of the scheme have been considered very positively, our team has had some fun along the way.  The Management Committee is delighted that our staff members at Barrhead HA have been recognised for their efforts.”  The Association will receive the formal Gold Award at the HWL presentation in October 2011.

Photographed are 8 members of staff completing the 5k Race for Life in Glasgow in June 2011- a commitment to improving fitness as part of the HWL initiative.

FLAIR’S SECOND CONFERENCE – JUNE 2011

In partnership across the local area, FLAIR (the Federation of Local Associations in Renfrewshire and East Renfrewshire) held its second annual staff and committee conference at the Glynhill Hotel on 9th June 2011.

With guest speakers including the President of the Chartered Institute of Housing, Jim Strang (from Uplawmoor) opened the conference and gave a good presentation on the local difficulties facing housing associations going forward. The conference held workshops on a range of topics including welfare reform, supporting people, joint procurement, housing need and demand, and mystery shopping exercise recently undertaken. The conference closed with Dr Mary Taylor the Chief Executive of the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations providing a discussion on the main issues facing Associations and the work of the SFHA in lobbying for change.

Photographed, we saw FLAIR spokesperson from Linstone HA Nanette Reid launching the second Annual Review 2010 which has now been issued to all local tenants and residents. The conference was attended by about 85 delegates and was judged a great success.

Policy Consultation : The Association is committed to including our tenants in the review of our service delivery policies. We are really keen to hear from our tenants and feedback would greatly assist our policy reviews.  Policies being reviewed during 2011/12 will be :

Formal Execution of Documents                  Co-opted Members

Form & Content of Minutes                        Committee Expenses

Smoke Free                                            Notifiable Events

Information Technology                            Asset Management Strategy

Procurement                                           Insurance

Rent Setting                                           Tenant Participation

Anti-social & Neighbour Disputes                 Property Manual

Right to Repair

Association Sets Objectives for 2011/16 : The Management Committee has approved the Association's Internal Management Plan and set the organisation's Business Objectives for 2010/11. Click here for further information.  Work is now progressing to update our plans for 2011/12 onwards.

Happy to Translate - The Association has recently become a member of Happy to Translate.   This initiative has been developed to assist people who speak little, or no English, or who use non-verbal language.   The Happy to Translate logo symbolises successful communication between two people who do not share a common language.  Organisations that display the logo will provide language assistance in the form of confidential translation and interpretation.

When a customer who speaks, or reads little or no English visits a Happy to Translate logo organisation, a member of staff will follow a few simple steps to determine what language the customer prefers to use and what information or service they require. This may include asking the customer to point to their language on a language chart, or the use of a telephone language service. Once language and need are determined an appointment will be made on the customer's behalf with a professional interpreter or for documents to be translated into an appropriate language.

If you require any assistance or further information please contact our office.

Partnering Opportunities : Most residents will know that we work with our Renfrewshire Housing Association partners, FLAIR, and have done so for many years. A copy of our latest Annual Review is available. Please click here.

We are now also working with Inverclyde local associations to form I-FLAIR. We see the benefits of future partnerships working for the development of new housing, but also for potential financial savings through tendering for our planned maintenance programmes. The Scottish Government would wish us to see benefits for delivering bigger programmes at reduced costs ! We are now in the process of developing a separate website for IFLAIR - so watch this space for more details soon.

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