Club owner Bill Gavin backing YMCA's £13.5m Orchard development
Nov 23 2009 by Kat Keogh, Birmingham Mail
ONE of the leading lights of Birmingham’s club scene has pledged his support to a £13.5 million project to help the city’s homeless.
Bill Gavin, founder of the city’s Gay Pride Festival and owner of Subway City nightclub, is the first businessman to donate money under a new fundraising scheme to the YMCA development in Erdington.
The 59-year-old said his own experience of homelessness as a young man lead him to champion the Orchard development.
Work is already underway on the development, which is replacing the former YMCA hostel with 83 self-contained flats and a centre to serve the needs of the community.
The Reservoir Road centre will provide a nursery, youth centre, community hall and resources to support local social enterprises
Some £12 million of funding has already been secured, but organisers are now looking to raise the final £1.5 million needed to complete the project.
Bill, who became homeless at the age of 25 due to alcohol and drug abuse, said: “I joined Alcoholics Anonymous in 1976 and have been sober and free of drugs ever since.
“I used places like the YMCA and those places helped me get started again in life.”
The entrepreneur said his own story proved how vital centres like the YMCA were for the community.
“When you are that far down, loneliness and despair kicks in and you have a feeling of hopelessness, but people at places like this change that feeling into endless hope.”
It is hoped that local businesses people and organisations will follow Bill’s lead and join the development’s Hundred Club scheme. Organisers are looking for businesses to donate £2,500 to the project and firms will be awarded a place on a wall of fame.
Birmingham YMCA chief executive Alan Fraser said Bill was “an inspiration”.
“Bill is the embodiment of what we are trying to do here.
“When people see homeless people or people on drugs they think they will have those problems for their whole life, but Bill shows that doesn’t always have to be the story.”
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