Category: News

It’s not often we post articles outside of DBA’s main interests and objectives in our NEWS section but this article is a good read about making homes safer for people living with sight loss. The article includes thoughts from a vision loss specialist, who has lived with low vision her whole life due to cone-rod dystrophy.

Be like Liz! If any of you kindly folk are interested at all in helping us out with local bucket collections, we have the following coming up in the next couple of months:

Thursday 1st August – TESCO Branksome

Tuesday 20th August – TESCO Blandford

Friday 6th September – Wimborne Town Centre

Friday 23rd August – Wimborne Town Centre

Friday 6th September – Wimborne Town Centre

Simple two hour shift (one of 10-12; 12-2; 2-4) of holding a donation bucket for benevolent types to drop their pennies and pounds in. You don’t need any detailed knowledge about the charity, what we do or who we support – a sprawling information stand will be on site 🙂

Please email Gareth at gareth@dorsetblind.org.uk or call on 01202 712864 if you’re able to help out. We really appreciate your efforts, thanks.

As it nears the end of its 11th year, Dorset For Singing shows no sign of slowing down. With a membership of around 170 culled from Dorchester, Weymouth, Portland and surrounding areas, the community choir has become well-known in key community events and has raised over £15,000 for good causes from concert revenues.

This year, the Weymouth and Portland branch kindly supported Dorset Blind Association, voted by the choir members. During the year, they managed to raise an impressive £1300 for us to put towards our services for local blind and partially sighted people in the area. Last week, they kindly welcomed us to a rehearsal at All Saints School in Wyke Regis for a cheque presentation with our member, Sam Cole. Now THERE’s a colourful photo! Thanks, guys and gals!

Choirmaster and director, Ed Hintze, said “We have very much enjoyed supporting our nominated charity, the Dorset Blind Association. Although our emphasis is on singing for enjoyment, it is great that a bi-product our singing is to raise money and awareness for local and national charities.” 

Subscriptions are just £3 and there are further discounts for termly or annual membership. Anybody interested in joining is welcome to turn up to a rehearsal when the new term starts on Wednesday 25th September – your first session is FREE. For further information please call Jenny, Choir Manager, on 07723453619.

We have been lucky enough to secure a number of bucket collection days at Haskins Garden Centre, Ferndown this month. If you, or indeed anyone you know, might be able to spare a couple of hours to help out, please contact Gareth at gareth@dorsetblind.org.uk or call the fundraising office on 01202 712864. You don’t need to have any knowledge of the charity to help as we will have an information stand on site – just a willingness to hold a bucket and smile.

Quick bit of celebratory Dorset Blind Association news for you in that our flagship Ferndown shop is 100 WEEKS OLD this week – hurrah! And what better way of celebrating a flagship shop than popping a brand spanking new feather FLAG right outside. Certainly a good day for it!

What An Accomplishment!

This week we celebrated a milestone for Judith as she reached 40 years as a volunteer for Dorset Blind Association, so we took the opportunity to throw a little get together for her and present her with a few tokens of our appreciation. From her early days as a volunteer to eventually becoming Chairman, Judith has seen the charity change “out of all recognition” during her tenure, progressing into what it is today.

Judith originally joined up with DBA (then operating as Dorset County Association for the Blind) when she moved to Christchurch and answered an advert in the local paper asking for voluntary drivers who could spare an hour a month to drive blind people to their respective social clubs. She quickly followed this up by arranging transport, helping to run the club, meeting home visitors and social workers for the newly-formed sensory loss team, and then established herself on the charity’s executive committee before becoming Vice Chairman and Chairman. It’s safe to say Judith has covered her fair share of roles during her time with us, so much so that her presence is woven into the fabric of the charity itself.

Thank you, Judith.