Video: John Norris explains how the community project will benefit the Welfare Centre
A community centre in Arnold has been given a face lift by a Nottingham painting firm for free.
The Old People’s Welfare Centre on Nottingham Road relies on donations and income from hiring out rooms in order to continue providing classes and events for the elderly in the community.
Norris UK, a painting and refurbishing company from Basford, has painted two of the centre’s rooms for free as part of a new community project.
Sandra Cockburn, chairman of the centre, said: “Our funds are quite sparse, we are able to pay out for everyday things but bigger projects we have to prioritise.
“We emailed Norris UK to see if they could help in any way, to our delight they rang back and said they would decorate two rooms here at the centre.
“It’s going to be a great help and it has saved us a lot of money and we are really grateful that they can help.
“It’s excellent, there must be lots of charities and community services that need projects like this to help them. Funds are not easy to come by, it’s not like it used to be years ago where people would leave donations for you.”
The centre was built in 1954 and has been run by people in Arnold ever since, and Sandra runs a line dancing class every Thursday.
She added: “Most of the elderly people in Arnold do some activity here, such as line dancing, everyone comes along and enjoys themselves.”
John Norris, Managing Director of Norris UK, said: “We have been carrying work out for 25 years now so we decided it was time to perhaps look at a community project where we put a bit back.
“Arnold Welfare Centre is entirely dependent on generating its own funds from the premises.
“It needed a bit of work done so we decided to help out.
“In a relatively short space of time we’ve been able to improve the centre’s ability to let its rooms out in an environment which is a little bit more attractive than it was before.”
