2020 presented challenges to us and our customers in ways that we have never experienced before.
As I reflect on this year, I would like to thank our customers, staff and volunteers across Warrington Housing Association, LifeTime and WhiA for their incredible efforts to demonstrate compassion, kindness and community spirit at a time when it has been needed more than ever.
Our vision to “make Warrington a great place to live” has been delivered in ways we would not have imagined at the beginning of 2020. Given all the things we have managed to achieve, I forget sometimes that we are a relatively small organisation – so this a real credit to everyone involved.
We have made a commitment to grow and, despite the challenges presented by the pandemic, we were proud to open Winbourne Close- where we were able to offer the 11 affordable homes to key workers as a priority – as well progress developments at Delta Crescent and Penketh’s retirement housing scheme. Hopefully much more to come on this in 2021 as we support the wider borough to tackle the affordable housing crisis.
Aside from new developments, we retain our focus on supporting existing customers holistically with the work Stephen Higham leads in relation to money advice – which has proven critical this year for many customers – and Gerry Kiddle’s team’s focus on supporting over 55s through the Lifetime service.
We were also proud to re-launch our retirement living service and announce a flexible partnership approach to ensuring our customers have as many opportunities as possible to live life to the full.
Even during this difficult time, our involved customers have continued to do their bit. This is very important to us and we genuinely appreciate the role that our customer-led scrutiny panel, WHASP, and our wider customer base play in helping to keep us on our toes in terms of the quality and type of service we provide.
Slightly more mundane, but our new IT system has marked a significant milestone in the way we work. We’ve worked hard implementing it over the last 6 months or so and it will improve customer access through our portal and will also improve the way we run our “back office” services.
As we look towards 2021, I hope we can retain the community spirit and team work that has provided hope during this year – while also hoping for a return to normality!
Wishing you a safe and happy festive season,
David Cummins
