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Easterhouse Locality Plan
Easterhouse is located around 6 miles east of the city centre. Thriving Places covers the area that runs up to the city boundary line in the North and the M8 to the South. This takes in Provanhall, Blairtummock, Easterhouse, Rogerfield, Lochend, Gartloch, Kildermorie, Commonhead and Bishoplochand.
Thriving Places was introduced in Easterhouse in 2016 to help improve the quality of life of people who live and work here. This can mean trying to improve health and wellbeing, community safety, education, employment, income, housing, the local environment or access to services. It can also mean encouraging local involvement in decision making. This 10-year plan will tell you more about what Thriving Places is doing in Easterhouse.
2020/21 Update
The year began with the start of Covid-19 lockdown, which disrupted planned activities for Thriving Places in Easterhouse. For example, a large-scale community breakfast had been planned jointly with the Community Connector for Springboig/Barlanark for the end of March 2020. Much of the coming year's consultation was dependent on the connections that would be made with residents at this event. Unfortunately, it had to be cancelled with only a few days' notice. Despite this setback, a plan was put in place to engage with the community in accordance with the changing restrictions.
Throughout the year, the Community Connector made multiple contacts with local residents and deliveries of food, clothing and kitchen white goods were sourced from local support agencies. This work was supported by East End Flat Pack Meals, FARE and Connect Community Trust. The Community Connector has also worked with Connect Community Trust, Glasgow East Women's Aid, Easterhouse Parish Church, Denmilne Action Group, the Pavillion, Phoenix Easterhouse, The Glenburn Centre, Jobs and Business Glasgow, Easterhouse Citizen's Advice Bureau, the Food Pantries in Ruchazie and Parkhead/Shettleston and local Community Links Workers.
For example, the Community Connector sourced and delivered mobile phones and laptops were sourced and delivered by the Community Connector to four people within the Easterhouse area. This enabled them to stay connected with Jobcentre Plus, help with school work, support the language needs of one family and help people stay connected to their wider families and communities.
Also, within a few weeks of the first lockdown a newly qualified nurse made contact with Thriving Places Easterhouse regarding a need for accommodation. She had just been employed to work on a Covid-19 ward and needed to isolate from her family, who were shielding. The Community Connector helped by putting out a request on social media and contacting estate agents. The nurse was offered a flat near the hospital, free of charge. She remained in the flat for three months, before moving into alternative accommodation. Without this support she would have been unable to take up the post.
During Winter 2020, enquiries were made to the Community Connector regarding donation of clothes and games. The Community Connector connected the donations to Easterhouse Community Church and the games were distributed to local families and the clothing to a homeless rehabilitation centre. Sunshine Wishes, a charity, also contacted the Community Connector to help distribute 12 winter jackets for local children. The Community Connector contacted Easterhouse Community Church and Connect Community Trust, who both nominated six children who were in need.
The connector also supported Easterhouse Baptist Church with "Easterhouse has Talent" online competition. This provided a positive activity for participants and raised the profile of the Community Connector within Easterhouse.
The Community Connector has helped disseminate key information on support services available locally in different ways such as providing listings for the North East Pathfinder website (https://www.northeastglasgow.co.uk/), providing information leaflets for Covid-19 compliant Easter bags and making regular use of social media.
Local people in Easterhouse and Springboig/Barlanark were surveyed in 2020/2021 to identify local priorities, with 198 responses. The results suggest that fly-tipping, littering, lack of litter bins, reduced bin collections, dog-fouling, the condition and safety of road and outdoor activity facilities are local priorities. However, further research is required. The Community Connector also supported the work of the Social Recovery Taskforce by interviewing vulnerable people who had previously been on the Glasgow City Council shielding list. Most people the Community Connector spoke to were residents of Easterhouse, providing further insight into the type of support needed going forward. It also afforded the opportunity to speak with those that would have been harder to engage with due to health reasons.
Thriving Places Easterhouse benefitted from connection with students at Glasgow Kelvin College. When Covid-19 restrictions allowed, the Community Connector engaged with various classes within Glasgow Kelvin College at the Easterhouse Campus. These included adult learners, a local history group, and community development students. This provided an opportunity for conversation regarding the remit of Thriving Places and informed content for the revised locality plan.
The Community Connector helped disseminate Wee G Community Grants, funding made available by HSCP (up to £750) for North East Glasgow Projects.
2019/20 Update
A new Community Connector, Donna McGill, started work in Easterhouse in April 2019. Donna works for Glasgow Kelvin College and grew up in the local area. During her first couple of months, Donna met with people from more than 80 different organisations and services to learn what was happening in the local area.
Donna also spoke with local people who were not involved in existing community groups or organisations. One of the ways she did this was through Facebook. Between April 2019 and March 2020, the Thriving Places Easterhouse Facebook page grew by 500 people, giving local residents information about events, jobs, local services and businesses, the Community Council, local initiatives, free/low cost activities for local people, local councillors and MP's surgeries and local good news stories.
The local projects and services promoted included litter-picking, cycling, recycling, health, food-growing and foodbanks, as well as raising awareness of issues such as domestic violence, suicide, homelessness and addiction.
New projects arose from the Facebook page. For example, ten local people come together to learn how to cook healthy food for an initial six-week programme. The project was also supported by Beth Parker, a student in Community Development at the University of Glasgow. The group continued to meet after the initial six-week programme to learn new skills and get involved in shaping the refreshed locality plan.
The Community Connector attended all gala days and events in Easterhouse between April 2019 and March 2020, having in-depth conversations with local people about changes they would like to see locally. People shared concerns about affordable access to healthy food, littering and fly-tipping, improvements to the local shopping centre, safety at night (particularly for older people) and more things for young people to do locally.
Community groups were also visited by Donna, to encourage people to get involved in changing the local area. The groups included the FARE lunch club, the knitting group at Platform, Platform Singers, the Sunday Social and the Phoenix women's group.
Throughout the year Donna worked with partner organisations such as FARE, Phoenix, Connect Community Trust, Platform, The Pavillion, Community Links practitioners and many others. For example, she helped FARE run their young enterprise "pop-up" coffee mornings and co-delivered a session on mental health to a class of 5th and 6th year pupils at Lochend Community High School. Also, Donna worked with Glasgow Community Energy to recruit local volunteers to repair fencing and improve grounds in the local nursery. Six residents from Eskdale House volunteered with the project, painting and repairing some fencing and tidying up some raised growing beds. This helped to improve the outside area of the nursery and create a more positive reputation for Eskdale House amongst local people.
Twice-weekly drop-in sessions for local people were held in a unit in the Lochs Shopping Centre over a three-month period. Forty people came into the unit during this time. However, the unit had to be closed due to a leak and further required repairs.
A large-scale community breakfast had been arranged for March 2020. This was to give local residents the chance to meet each other, find out more about local organisations and services and potentially get actively involved in refreshing the locality plan. However, due to the spread of Covid-19, the breakfast had to be cancelled.
Progress 2018/2019
During 2018/19 the organisations involved in Thriving Places in Easterhouse worked together to deliver a range of activities, including:
- A Community Safety Consultation with local people was carried out. A range of work was undertaken following this including fixed penalty notices issued for dog fouling and littering; CCTV patrols deployed; assisting local schools and nurseries to carry out clean ups; local park areas de-littered and fly tipping removed.
- Winterfest 2018 took place in The Lochs shopping centre in Easterhouse. This included community stalls; cooking demos; festive arts activities and a visit from Santa with a small gift. Feedback from the event was very positive.
- 10,000 copies of Easterhouse Today, a community newspaper was printed and distributed locally. The purpose of the newspaper is to signpost activities within the area and raise the profile of the area. The paper was co-produced with local young people.
How You Can Get Involved
If you are looking for information about what you can get involved with in Easterhouse get in touch with your Community Connector Donna McGill at donnamcgill@glasgowkelvin.ac.uk
Papers for Steering Group
2019
2018
Further Information
The full locality plan for Easterhouse can be found here 
Easterhouse Locality Plan [1Mb]
Website: https://northeastglasgow.co.uk/thriving-places
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/thrivingeasterhouse/
Twitter:http://twitter.com/TEasterhouse
Instagram: http://instagram.com/thrivingplaceseasterhouse/
Information on this webpage is provided by Easterhouse Thriving Places steering group, and may not necessarily reflect the views of Glasgow Community Planning Partnership.