This week, Pete Jones, our Grants Manager, visited Haven’s Connections Café at The Hillcrest Community Centre in Newhaven with Kelvin Macleod, Stakeholder Manager at Rampion Offshore Wind. Haven’s Community Hub received a grant from the Rampion Community Benefit Fund last year.
Pictured above are Richard Young (volunteer), Paula Woolven BEM, Dawn Norman, Kelvin Macleod (RWE) & Francesca Lowton.
Havens Connections Café was launched in September 2024, after Havens Community Hub worked in partnership with the Hillcrest Community Centre to re-open the space known locally as the ‘Heart of the Community’. They quickly recruited and trained a dozen local volunteers who help prepare food donated by Havens Food Cooperative, a partner project that rescues and redistributes up to three tonnes of food from supermarkets weekly to hundreds of residents and groups.
Support from FareShare Sussex & Surrey also means the prices are low and affordable and the unique to the area ‘pay-it-forward’ scheme enables people to eat for a donation or free if required. Children can eat for £1 all year round, and the café has already hosted breakfast clubs for local nurseries and primary schools. It was also a registered 'warm space' in autumn and winter.
With two secure Wi-Fi-enabled computers in the café, people can get online while enjoying their refreshments. Many local groups use the space for informal meet-ups, including a new British Sign Language coffee morning starting in May.
The café hosts between 40 and100 visitors per day, depending on the activities taking place. It also has a zero-waste policy, with all peelings and leftovers being turned into compost in the outdoor ‘hot bins’. This is then donated to local gardeners who give their surplus produce to the centre!
Learn more about Havens Community Hub.
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