The new Ross Horizon Centre, welcomes adults with learning difficulties, who used to attend the Ryefield Centre.

Maria, with colleagues, Clarissa Hill and Lou Elsmore, were made redundant when their employer, Brandon Trust, withdrew from running the day centre at the Ryefield Centre and Herefordshire Council was unable to keep it open.

The women, who pooled their redundancy pay to get The Ross Horizon Day Centre started, are desperate for more funding and hope that donations to their Crowdfunding page will raise £1,000 to help to keep the service going. Lou said: “We have applied for grants but these take time to be awarded and we need money quickly.”

An earlier Crowdfunding page was very well supported but the amount proved out of reach for the time allowed. The trio are really grateful for the support they have received so far, especially from local businesses and hope that the new target of £1,000 will be achieved.

The Horizon Centre offers a range of activities, from doing arts and crafts, gardening and woodworking to developing IT skills, exercising and going to music groups. They are also active in the community, selling things they make at the local market, socialising and participating in events.

They also offer new opportunities and will ‘go the extra mile’ to help long-held dreams come true if they can. They believe that ’our smallness is our strength,’ allowing them to be more flexible and innovative in order to deliver an excellent service. They offer free taster days so that people can find out more about them before signing up.

The ladies said: “Like many people, we feel strongly that there should be a local day centre that provides an innovative, vibrant and person-centred service for adults with learning and other disabilities.”

£270 of the £1,000 target has been reached so far.

To support the Horizon Day Centre visit:www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/ross-on-wye-horizon-centre.