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How the LS14 Trust is bringing the North Seacroft community closer together through food
Established in 2009 by a group of local people who wanted to bring about positive change in their community, the LS14 Trust has become an ever-present feature of North Seacroft over the last 15 years.
In the absence of other community facilities such as cafes and pubs, social isolation has become a growing concern in Seacroft – particularly since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. This issue has become a core focus for the Trust, which delivers an array of projects designed to build networks, promote health and wellbeing and much more. And with the help of a £40,000 Community Grant over two years from The Greggs Foundation, the LS14 Trust has been able to expand and develop the Seacroft Pantry – a critical service that now sits at the heart of the organisation’s work.
“Our USP as a charity is that we are a strength-based community trust, which means that the starting point for our work is always: what’s strong not what’s wrong. This means we build on the opportunities in the community rather than looking to directly tackle crises. Our work takes in a range of different initiatives and projects from youth work to health and wellbeing support to community climate action training. We also work within a network of third-sector organisations called We Are Seacroft, which collaborates to drive positive change within the local area across a wide range of programmes and activities. One of our key initiatives in recent years has been the Seacroft Pantry and Community Kitchen, which was created to provide continued support around food security post-Covid.”Chris Jackson, Director of Operations for LS14
With a membership of more than 750 households, the Seacroft Pantry is supporting a sizeable portion of the 30,000 residents in the Seacroft estate in 2024. As well as providing access to nutritious and affordable food, members are further supported through cookery classes, nutritional advice and recipe ideas. The Pantry helps people to gain the knowledge and confidence to cook from scratch, which is essential in helping them to utilise the produce available from the Pantry.
A subsidised café runs alongside the Pantry, providing locals with a warm and cost-effective space to socialise and connect with others. As Chris explains, this environment has proved itself to be invaluable to a growing number of members:
“We know that people who are feeling anxious or isolated need to have a reason to leave their homes, whether it’s to collect food or to take part in an activity. There’s something about that practical functional element that makes it easier to meet up with other people.
“While the Pantry is primarily about accessing food, many people come to hang out, feel safe and connect with others. For the LS14 Trust it also provides an opportunity for us to signpost a broad range of other services such as mental health support, help with managing high blood pressure and even advice relating to instances of domestic abuse. We work closely with the primary care network to get the right support to people who come in.”
While Chris says that many of the 67 projects delivered by the LS14 Trust can be tricky to measure in terms of impact and succcess, the Pantry is relatively easy in that regard. In its first two years it has grown from 30 members to 750 members, indicating both the value it adds and the demand for the service within the Seacroft community.
Around 80 of those members have subsequently gone on to sign up for other programmes and initiatives run by LS14 or a partner organisation – in addition to the unofficial support provided by the Pantry’s volunteers and staff.
Having received a previous grant from the Greggs Foundation, which helped the Pantry to become established, the recent Community Grant is contributing towards the salary of the café/pantry manager – taking the overall staff total at the Trust to 18.
As Chris suggests, the creation of this role has helped the Pantry to provide a more established, efficient and rounded service to members:
“It enables us to have some real stability in our service provision, which would otherwise be quite difficult to get. What’s great about this particular grant funding is that, while we are clear about how we intend to use the funding, we also have the flexibility to adapt as the needs of the community evolve and change.
“For us, it feels like once you’ve built a relationship with the Greggs Foundation they trust you to use the funding in the right way. As an organisation they clearly have similar beliefs and values to our organisation and the funding process has never been overly complex, which is quite refreshing.”
Asked how he sees the charity developing over the coming months and years, Chris says,
“Every year that we deliver projects in the community we build stronger relationships. This gives us the ability to make earlier interventions with people who are experiencing challenges. And ultimately, this helps us to make more of a difference to their lives in the long term.”