Fund-raising for facilities for the blind at Hillsborough

[Guest phshaw]

I have been supporting Sheffield Wednesday for 50 years and I was a teacher of children with a visual impairment for 25 years, including being Deputy Head of Tapton Mount School for the Blind in Sheffield for a period in the 1980s. This school has now closed and has been replaced by a Service which supports children with a visual impairment in their local schools.

Unfortunately I had to take early retirement from work last year as after surgery to remove a cancer from my leg, complications set in resulting in removal of my lymph nodes in my right leg. Consequently I suffer from lymphodemia in this leg; this has left me with a degree of disability in that I can only stand still for very short periods and cannot sit for extended periods without mobilising my leg as it can become very swollen within a short period of time. Walking is painful and difficult over short distances although after I have managed to walk about 3 miles, the lymph gets pumped and I can walk easier and relatively pain free. Needless to say my condition requires daily management and to alleviate the pain and discomfort I have taken to long distance walking, raising money for local charities in the Filey/Scarborough region (where I live) in the process.

On August 6/7th I will be doing the 42 mile Lykewake Walk within 24 hours across the whole of the North Yorkshire Moors, from Osmotherley in the West to Ravenscar in the East. By doing this I am hoping to raise money towards audio access facilities for the blind at Hillsborough. Shrewsbury Town was the first league club to have audio facilities for the blind where several designated seats had earphone facilities where the blind children could listen to the hospital commentary of the game whilst simultaneously enjoying the atmosphere inside the stadium. When I taught at RNIB Condover Hall in Shrewsbury, going to the match was the highlight of the week for some of the children. When I worked at Tapton Mount many of the children loved going to Hillsborough but were dependent on myself or someone else to commentate above the noise of the crowd. The technology has moved on since those days and it is my understanding that Arsenal's Emirates Stadium has excellent audio access facilities for the visually impaired. For more information view

http://www.rnib.org.uk/xpedio/groups/public/ documents/publicwebsite/ public_sportdescription.hcsp

http://www.accessaudio.co.uk/acatalog/ RAD__Radio_Audio_Description_.html

I am doing this walk on behalf of Wednesdayite (Sheffield Wednesday Supporters' Society) who support this project and Paul Holmes, the Financial Director, has already pledged £480 from the Utilities Fund for it. Wednesdayite are committed to making Hillsborough an inclusive environment for all supporters and all money raised will be ring fenced specifically for this project. If you would like to sponsor me there are essentially three ways of doing this:

1. By paypal to; payments@wednesdayite.com Please put "blind facility" in the comments box.

2. By cheque; please make payable to "Wednesdayite Facilities Fund" and send to Wednesdayite, PO BOX 3928, Sheffield, S6 9AY.

3.By bank transfer to the Facilities Fund account (Sort Code 05-08-48, A/c No. 19998586).

For international transfers: IBAN GB10YORK0508481998586

I am looking to raise £4,000 which I believe should cover the whole cost of installing access audio facilities and make watching Sheffield Wednesday at Hillsborough an enjoyable experience for future generations of supporters who are visually impaired. David Blunkett is a patron of Wednesdayite and when the facilities are eventually installed, we anticipate approaching David to apply some quality control over the installation.

Your support would be much appreciated with this venture, Peter Shaw.

[Daz]

This is an excellent initiative and I will personally pledge £100 to such a great cause.

Well done Peter - you deserve to meet your objective and I hope lots of fellow owls can help in any way with any sum large or small.

[cardiffowl06]

Extremely good work there!

Welldone - Like Daz said, you deserve to meet your objective, and Im sure owls fans can do that.

Im sure to get more publicity you could get a main news article on Wednesdayite.com about raising funds, I know a lot of wednesday fans keep checking that site a lot recently because of the takeover.

[Guest phshaw]

Cheers Darryl for such a large donation and the comments, much appreciated. I will act on the excellent suggestion by Cardiff Owl in the next day or so.

[cardiffowl06]

Also, because of previous wednesdayite donations being rejected a few people over at www.owlszone.co.uk have concerns the money may be rejected because of club politics.

It would be a great idea to ensure the club will accept the money and spend it on improving audio facilities.

[Guest phshaw]

That is a good point and one which members of the Wednesdayite Board have considered. The money will be ring fenced for this purpose and will sit in the Facilities account until either things change at SWFC Board level or until permission is granted by the current Board. However I would expect the current Board to be amenable to the idea; there is nothing to be gained from anybody being hostile to it and such obstruction would be a flagrant violation of the Disability Discrimination Act.