History

Pulborough & District Community Care Association (PDCCA) was founded in the early 1960s by Rev. Desmond Bending and Jean Seagrim.

At that time Rev. Desmond Bending and Jean Seagrim, were both involved with several voluntary activities in the village.

The Darby and Joan Club, a social club for the elderly, used to meet in what was then the Working Men’s Club. There was also an Old People’s Welfare Association, and Jean had started a “Meals on Wheels” service in 1962. In 1966, wishing to co-ordinate these activities,  Rev. Desmond Bending and Jean Seagrim drew up a constitution and registered their activities as a charity under the name of Pulborough and District Community Care Association. There have been 3 Chairman's, they are Jean Seagrim, Gwen Parr and the current John Dixon.

Transport Schemes

Then as now, transport was a problem for those without a car. The village churches had a Good Neighbours’ Scheme and through this a car transport scheme was organised for Pulborough during the 1970s. This ran alongside the hospital car service operated by the Red Cross, which was more extensive as it also covered adjacent villages. Eventually these schemes amalgamated and about 6 years ago our Community Car Transport Scheme was launched.

Meanwhile the PDCCA heard that a Minibus had been introduced in Selsey and a visit was arranged to find out exactly what was entailed. The Minibus scheme was so impressive that a fundraising scheme quickly started in Pulborough and many a delicious cake was baked and sold, resulting after 3 years in the arrival of the Pulborough Minibus in 1976.

Minibuses became so popular that very soon the West Sussex Community Minibus Association was formed. Responsibility for our Minibus passed to this new voluntary group, thus relieving us of a lot of work and responsibility.

Lunch Club & Visiting Scheme

In 1977 a weekly Lunch Club began, and 5 years later a social afternoon was added which became our Wednesday Club.

For many years Jean Seagrim and some of her friends had an informal arrangement for visiting the housebound in Pulborough. In 1998 the Volunteer Visiting Scheme was set up to expand this work and to train the volunteers involved.

Age Concern in the late 70s, suggested a Day Centre for Pulborough but it received little support at the time. Jean Seagrim then proposed a weekly “pop-in” for all ages and thus in 1981 Pop into Pulborough (PiP) was born. At that time it was common for people to bring young children along to PiP and from this another scheme developed to provide a holiday club for children age 5-11. This was so successful that it was taken over by the statutory bodies. In 2003 PiP began to host a once monthly meeting for anyone with visual impairment and this proved very useful.

Other Services

In the Millennium year we started the Millennium Society.

We funded the Village Clock and we also launched the current thriving village market.

Our Toenail Cutting Service was extremely well attended but sadly this was cancelled due to Covid.

And so that is how the PDCCA grew and we will continue to flourish and spread other useful schemes around whenever the opportunity arises.

Support the PDCCA

Without your support we wouldn't have been able to help so many people in our community. If you would like to contribute to our on-going work to care for those in our area who need just a little more care then

Whatever you donate will make a difference to our community. Thank you in advance.