This page is a brief history of Outline, from it's origins in 1999 to the present day. Use the hyperlinks in the left hand bar to jump to a particular year.
How it all began
Outline began as a project started by the Surrey Care Trust to establish a helpline to support LGBT people up to the age of 25.The Helpline was run by two youth group volunteers and advertisements were placed in local papers to attract volunteers to maintain the phone line. Seven people attended the first meeting which identified areas of training required for the new volunteers.
The helpline had many calls but mostly from people who were over the age of 25. As it was Surrey Care Trust’s remit to work with the under 25s, they felt that they could not meet the costs of continuing the line as it was no longer age specific.
Whilst Surrey Care Trust could also no longer provide accommodation to the phone line a £2000 grant was secured from West Surrey Health Authority to help with running costs, training new volunteers and advertising. The first training for the LGBT Helpline volunteers took place in the last quarter of 1998.
1999 was a very busy year for the new volunteers. Training was completed and the LGBT Helpline was re-named, "Outline" and it's new management committee were formed. Funding and new accommodation were at the top of the agenda, as the original £2000 grant was diminishing rapidly. Councils and individuals were approached for funding at this stage and a cash flow forecast was produced. Surrey Police also agreed to support Outline.The new organisation had to open a bank account, make publicity material, create an image, try to find accommodation, write a constitution, create a budget forecast and make links with other organisations (phew). National Friend was approached for affiliation. Finally, The birth of our logo and poster campaign, "Dark in the Closet", was agreed.
George Michael had offered an interest in patronising the organisation, whilst others had not responded to our letters. He donated a substantial sum of money to the organisation, which became a milestone in its development.
The helpline was temporarily re-located to the nearby home of one of the volunteers as permanent accommodation had not been found. It was voted that Outline should endeavour to become a registered charity. The constitution development and the application for charity status were sent to solicitors. Radio advertisements for new volunteers were transmitted by County Sound.
A funding bid from World Aids Day was established to produce an original web site and the birth of the COINS (Coming out in Surrey) Project. We also applied to the lottery for funding andour first press release was issued to attract new volunteers.
A new training programme was established and scheduled due to the successful response from the press release whilst a member of the committee was appointed the new training co-ordinator. We received a grant from the World Aids Day fund to the sum of £1150 from local Health Authorities and Social Services.
Publicity on Eagle FM attracted more new volunteers and the first phase of the COINS project took place as we registered our web site name - www.outlinesurrey.org. George Michael kindly agreed to sign 12 Copies of his latest CD "Songs from the last Century" in time to raffle or auction for Christmas.
2000 saw the second instalment of monies received for the COINS project and £1000 was pledged by Woking Borough Council. An interview was given by the chair of Outline with regards to George Michael's involvement in the organisation, together with articles in the Woking News and Mail and the Informer group of newspapers.
In February we had our first Annual General Meeting. The web site designer had been appointed on receipt of the final instalment for the COINS project and the relevant software packages required were sourced.
Surrey's LGBT youth group, Outcrowd, was ailing desperately and it was decided that Outline would offer a partnership in order to re-launch the youth group. This was funded by CD sales which raised £750.
Outcrowd was fully adopted by Outline, and a member of the Outline committee was appointed to deal with all Outcrowd matters. A project team was also put in place for the COINS project and the web site, as well as initiating the despatch of a 360 item mail shot enclosing posters and cards to all local GP's, GUM Clinics, hospitals and other local organisations. A liaison point between the committee and the new group of volunteers was established. The National Lottery fund granted Outline the sum of £3994.48.Nevertheless, Outline was still without accommodation after Runnymede Council denied a grant on the grounds of Section 28. This raised Outline's profile and a press release was sent to local papers and published. Struggling on, a live preliminary web site was put up and delegates attended the National Friend Conference in Cardiff. Local Centre Point was then approached for accommodation and they kindly granted use of their premises to house the line.
By this point, we had Surrey Herald and Informer adverts running on a weekly basis, alternating between Outcrowd and Outline.
Accommodation with Centre Point was put on hold due to Woking Borough Council expressing concerns that the use of the premises would be outside of the original specification on which Centre Point had been granted the lease. Meanwhile, the second phase of the COINS project was being developed and computers, a printer and software were purchased.
By the summer of 2000 considerable progress was made with COINS project. Brooklands College Students Union donated £250 towards the cost of a printer for the computer. The content of the site was taking longer than anticipated but was developing well. New volunteers were now shadowing the existing helpline volunteers. Outcrowd arranged a few social events, including an evening at the theatre and attending London Pride 2000.
At long last, the line has moved in to a new office in Woking, shared with another organisation. We celebrated the occasion with a little 'cheese and wine' opening at the new premises, and the official cutting of the ribbon!
Outline took part in the National Friend COMING OUT DAY 2000 whilst help lines across the country stayed open for 24 hours to receive calls from one national telephone number. Outline organised local publicity for the event and arranged a party in Woking. We all had a great evening, danced the night away, and saw many new faces.
2001 saw new members to the Outline committee welcomed, and two new trustees were elected. This year, Outline is open on Sunday evenings in addition to Tuesday evenings. Outline also successfully negotiated a community partnership with Woking Association of Voluntary Services whereby WAVS offered Outline a much needed office space. Our patron, George Michael, donated £3,900.
In 2002, audience members at the London Gay Symphony Orchestra collected over £100 for Outcrowd. Outline installed the Turing Project software donated by London Lesbian Gay Switchboard. The Turing Project is an IT system enabling us to log calls to the line and it provides access to a computerised database of gay resources across the country.
Members of Outcrowd took part in Walk for Life in 2003 to raise money for CRUSAID. SPACE Youth Group closed sadly leaving Outcrowd as the only LGBT youth group in Surrey. In this year, Outline also tendered a bid to Connexions Surrey where the plan was to fund a part time youth worker for Outcrowd. Sadly, at the end of the year, Outcrowd lost its meeting place.
2004 was financially a good year for Outline as it received awards from a variety of organisations: £1,500 awarded from Woking Borough Council, £500 awarded from Reigate and Banstead Borough Council and £500 awarded from Gatwick Community Airport Trust. It was also a good year for visibility as we had a presence at the first ever Reading Pride, handing out flyers to the public and doing an interview for Radio Berkshire. It culminated in the successful appointment of Connexions Personal Advisor. The post has been funded by Connexions Surrey and is being supported and hosted by Surrey County Youth Development Services. We are very pleased to have created the first post of this kind in the country.
In 2005, Outline began working with its new partners. We had a very successful re-launch to raise our profile and our new look website. There were many invited guests, not least the mayor and his lady wife. Outcrowd membership increased dramatically with the joint efforts of Outline and the Connexions PA, again, highlighting a real and great need for services and support for the LGBT community.
The workload on volunteers increased dramatically as well and working with two big statutory organisations proved challenging and unfortunately only lasted one year.
The second half of 2006 saw an increase in support and calls, as well as the success of the youth group re-finding its feet after the setback of 2005. By this point in time, Outline had also contributed in two pieces of consultation on the new Goods and Services Bill and the new Equality and Human Rights consultation hosted by Woking Borough Council.
In September, Outline ran a stall at Reading Pride, raising awareness of our services and also highlighting the lack of LGBTQ provisions in Surrey compared to those available in Berkshire. The day was very successful and we made many useful links with other local organisations. We even survived the storm force winds that threatened to send our gazebos into orbit! :)
2009 was extremely challenging for Outline and there have been a number of changes. We lost a lot of our volunteers but luckily the enthusiasm and commitment of those who remain have meant that the line has been kept open and available for those who need the service.
We have also noticed that many of those seeking help, advice or support now prefer to use e-mail, inresponce to this we significantly upgraded our website.
Outline attended Gay Surrey's event on IDAHO and Voluntary Action South West Surrey's Volunteer Fair.
So far 2010 has been an extremely busy year for Outline and its volunteers. In addition to our usual businees running our helpline we have also attended a number of events in order to raise our profile.
We were very pleased by be awarded Gay Surrey's Heart of Equality Award at the 2010 IDAHO Event.
We are also re-lauching our support group Outcrowd, this time geared towards adults, having identified a need for this service through numerous calls to our helpline.
The first Outcrowd meeting will take place in July.
