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About Independent Living Independent Living is a strand within our activities which focuses on proving support to enable vulnerable groups and individuals to live independently in the community. One of our major themes within independent living is that of having adequate accommodation and the support to make a success of living independently in that accommodation. This aspect of our work focuses on young people who are or are at risk of becoming homeless including help for particularly vulnerable groups such as care leavers. DISC has therefore developed a range of services in County Durham, the Tees Valley and Gateshead through the DISC Accommodation Resource Team which embraces a range of initiatives including Floating Support to vulnerable young people in housing tenancies and Advice and Guidance through a franchise with the Legal Aid Commission. DART also operates a support programme for care leavers. Although the main focus of the project is on accommodation related support, care leavers often have a range of other issues and needs. We are therefore moving the project towards the development of Integrated Support for care leavers which provide within one programme support also in relation to employment, drug abuse and offending. Also focusing on accommodation is our Home Safe Project whose initial aim was to help particularly vulnerable groups in the community live safely in their homes through the provision of security aids to those living in fear of crime in their own homes. This project has now broadened its remit to include mediation and is working in partnership with Help the Aged to provide a Handy Van service. Another aspect of this strand is supporting people with learning disabilities to maximise their ability to live as independent a life as possible in the community. Starting with the SPICE project in 1994, we also developed a befriending scheme under the name of GOAL and Choice which provides an advocacy service to people with learning disabilities. |
