Grateful client volunteers with Stroud charity
GRATEFUL Tracee Williams is throwing all her energies into fundraising for the charity that helped her when she hit rock bottom.
Stroud mum-of-four Tracee, 47, said her life was falling apart through undiagnosed illness before the town's Citizens Advice Bureau stepped in to assist.
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Tracee Williams, right, with CAB Stroud bureau manager Carla Evans.
Former company managing director Tracee said she was in a wheelchair with the bailiffs at her door when the CAB offered her a life raft.
"Unfortunately, because I hadn't been diagnosed, none of the insurances would pay out," said Tracee, who is now being treated for her genetic form of Parkinson's Disease.
"I was too weak to open an envelope and I was borrowing money to feed the kids. I was at rock bottom. The CAB was like a life raft. They got everything for me," Tracee said.
"We got this wonderful social worker who transformed our lives."
Long overdue diagnosis led to the correct medication and Tracee said: "Three days later I felt better. Three weeks after that I walked with my daughter to school. I went from a wheelchair, to two sticks to one and, at the moment, to none."
Tracee, who is mother of Rosie, 21, Harry, 14, Florence, nine, and step-mum to Jack, 17, said she began volunteering at the CAB and found her colleagues were unsung heroes.
"I was in the reception and saw them do such amazing work. They do this every day of the week. They saved three families from eviction the other week. But a lot of people don't realise it is a charity," Tracee said.
She has booked the energetic Soul Destroyers 14-piece band to play Stroud Subscription Rooms on April 9 for Stroud CAB.
The support act will be Sam Jones, Stroud's answer to Robbie Williams and winner of The Door youth charity's Undiscovered Talent Contest 2009.
CAB spokeswoman Anne Horner said Tracee was a whirlwind.
"We have never actively fund raised before but we are desperate for money," she said.
"Our grants from Stroud District Council are a great help but have been frozen for the past seven or eight years.
"Without help we will soon need to make cuts to bureau services. At the same time the demand for our services keeps going up and up."
Comments
by Philip Pankhurst, Herefordshire (living); Stroud (work)
Wednesday, March 17 2010, 10:06PM
“Good article, but I don't think it spells out how serious the financial position is. Despite the fact that like Bureaux up and down the country we are swamped with debt enquiries, my working week as Money Advice Manager has had to be cut by 1 day from April.
Clients coming through the door are up by at least 20% on last year, so it is inevitable that help with debt will have to be significantly reduced in a few weeks time. The provision of a Debt Relief Order service will have to be reconsidered, as will our pivotal role in the Mortgage Rescue Scheme. There is a very real risk that people may lose their homes as a result.”