About Us
Our aim is to support and encourage voluntary and community activity in North Herts.
We are here to help you – whether you are a charity / local community group looking for help and advice, or an individual looking to volunteer. As well as supporting local community and voluntary groups, we do a lot of work ‘behind the scenes’ for the benefit of the voluntary sector. This work includes helping to raise awareness of the issues and value of the voluntary sector as well as developing relationships / partnerships with statutory bodies, voluntary organisations and community groups. Through this work we can share information and views with local organisations and groups through our networking events and lunches as well as training courses.
History
There has been a long history of community activity in the North Herts area. The Letchworth Guild of Help, a forerunner organisation to North Herts CVS, goes right back to 1907. The Guild of Help provided a range of services for the community for more than 42 years. In 1949 a meeting was held to close down the Guild of Help and it was replaced with the Letchworth Council of Social Service.
The first official meeting of this new group was held in 1950 at the Brotherhood Hall in Letchworth. For the first eight years the minutes were written in copper plate handwriting with titles of topics underlined in red ink…..then in July 1957 technology arrived and from then on minutes were typed and then stuck into the minute book!
The 100th Meeting of the Executive Committee of the newly named “Letchworth and District Council for Social Service” was held in the Council Chamber of Letchworth Urban District Council on March 28th 1960.
Letchworth merged with the other North Herts towns to form the new local government area of North Hertfordshire District Council with the local government reforms in the 1970’s.
Today, at North Herts Centre for Voluntary Service, we have a team of staff based in our Letchworth offices where we continue to provide a range of services and projects to the North Herts community. We run the following:
- Respite Playschemes supporting children and young people aged 5-19 with special needs
- A Community Transport Scheme helping less able local people solve their transport problems
- A furniture re-use project providing quality low cost furniture to the local community
- Community Coffee Bar providing local residents with a meeting place to enjoy reasonably priced refreshments
- Time Bank providing an exciting new way for local people to become more involved with their local community and share skills
