Door to Fostering

My name is Debbie Carnell and I belong to the Progressive Community as well as being a member of staff at “Progressive Towers” in good old Peterborough.

On Wednesday 30 September Glen Delve was carrying out a course on JV. During the lunch break he, along with some of his delegates were in the break out area which is adjacent to my desk in the office. Glen was speaking to his delegates about what he does and how he likes to give back to the community. He was speaking about working with people who wish to adopt or foster young children as he feels that this is such a good and worthy cause. He said that he would like to help people financially if they have to make adaptions to their property to accommodate the needs of the young person that they are going to adopt or foster.
My ears pricked up when I heard this as, I along with my fostering partner Jayne, are approved foster carers for children with additional needs. We are, going to soon be getting our first permanent placement which is a young boy, who we will call “A”, who is 8 and suffers with severe autism along with other medical conditions. He has to take regular medication and has to be taken to the toilet every hour. Myself and Jayne, have a downstairs toilet but this toilet is only accessible by going out the back door, opening the garage door and then using the toilet. I spoke to Glen about the adaption that I need to make, which will assist “A” so that he does not have to keep going up and down the stairs. The adaption would cost approximately £3,000 and would consist of knocking through to the garage via the kitchen wall and putting in a door so that “A” could access the toilet easily. Glen suggested that I put this on the community page to see if anyone would be happy to help. Glen said he would happily make a pledge as unfortunately the local fostering agency do not help with this adaption and we are not financially sound, at this present time, to carry out this adaption.
This will not just help this young boy, but will be in place for many more foster children with additional needs that we are lucky enough to have the pleasure to look after in years to come.

If we are lucky enough to raise more than the allocated sum this will then allow us to make the required alterations to our bathroom which are needed but are not as much of a priority.

I would like to thank you for reading this message and if you would like to ask my any further questions please contact me.

Photo doesn't really show what we need.