| Just months after winning a prestigious award for Bio Day, the CSV Action Desk here at BBC Gloucestershire is up for another top honour. They have been shortlisted, from a list of 40,000 events, for the best local CSV Make A Difference Day event in the UK. It's for their initiative to spruce up the gateway to Gloucester - the area between the city's train station and the main shopping precinct - which involved more than 100 volunteers cleaning, planting and painting the area to the side of the bus station in October. The ceremony takes place tonight at Plaisterer's Hall, London on Thursday January 27. Positive Those people nominated for the CSV Make a Difference Day Awards are amongst the UK's top volunteers who have all had a positive impact on improving the lives of others in their community. The Awards, to be hosted by CSV's President, Lord Levy, will be attended by celebrities, MPs and national charities, who support and benefit from CSV Make a Difference Day.
Top names supporting the campaign include Davina McCall, Pete Waterman, Anthony Worrall-Thompson, Welsh First Minister Rhodri Morgan, Scotland's First Minister Jack McConnell and the MPs Jacqui Lait and Des Turner. A record breaking 90,496 volunteers took part in CSV's Make A Difference Day 2004, making a positive contribution to their local area.
Volunteers of all ages organised activities that included the transformation of an army barracks into a centre for homeless people, a fairtrade banana flash mob, a city garden makeover, and a clothes collection for newly arrived refugee and asylum seeker families. Welcoming One hundred and fifty people, including volunteers from the BBC Gloucestershire CSV Action Desk, the City Council, and a range of other groups got together to make the entrance to the city a more welcoming sight.
They cleaned, planted, painted and tidied the area, and a team of local young people painted murals depicting the cultural diversity in the city. Martin Evans (right), the CSV Action Desk Producer said: "The long term effect of the event is that it's made the area safer as crime has been dramatically reduced, the area is now much more attractive for visitors entering the city and has given the people that volunteered pride in their city." Other nominees in the Best Local CSV Activity Award category include CSV GO London, CSV Action Desk, West Midlands and CSV Millennium Volunteers, East Riding of Yorkshire. Elizabeth Salter, the CSV Make a Difference Day campaign manager said, "The awards showcase the impact that people giving time can have in just one day.
"As 2005 is Year of the Volunteer, we hope the awards will inspire even more people to volunteer and really make a difference to both their life and the lives of others." The 2005 CSV Make a Difference Day takes place on Saturday 29 October and promises to be the biggest and best yet.
To find out more about taking part, call free on 0800 284 533 or visit www.csv.org.uk/difference.
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BBC Gloucestershire's CSV Action Desk have been nominated for an award for their Make A Difference Day.
