This week has seen a milestone reached in the history of an organisation which has for many years been championing the cause of a reasonably large sector of our community, providing services for it and generally seeking to assist where it can.
I’m honoured to be one of its trustees. I became one partly because I was invited and partly because of a sight-stealing condition present in my own family.
If I ignore it, it could cost me my sight too. The condition is glaucoma and the organisation is the Northamptonshire Association For The Blind (NAB).
The milestone was the official opening of the new NAB Northampton Sight Centre in Kingsthorpe, opposite the large Waitrose store. Years ago the building was the borough council’s housing office, but now it has a new life as the operational headquarters of the NAB.
The charity has moved with the times, downsizing from its previous headquarters at Wardington Court and moving its operation to a purposely renovated site.
Selling up will provide much-needed funding with which the charity can continue its range of services from a new base, which is far better tailored to its needs and considerably more efficient to run.
The official opening was carried out by actress Lesley Joseph, who grew up in the town and whose own parents used to be practical supporters of the charity when they helped out with the production of the association’s Talking Newspaper.
The service, which continues to operate from the new centre, essentially re-reports the news of the county by harvesting it from a variety of providers.
It is then recorded onto cassettes and CDs which are distributed to the blind and visually impaired across the county. It’s an important part of what the charity provides, but is in no way the same as simply turning on a radio.
Instead it’s a bespoke service with its own identity which helps keep blind and visually-impaired people in touch with the world in which we all live.
Having Lesley Joseph along to perform the opening ceremony of the new building was as much about celebrating the community of the blind and visually impaired as it was about the milestone itself.
As a star of Birds Of A Feather, she was a prime example of someone using her position to bring the work of the charity to the attention of the wider world.
But Lesley wasn’t the only representative of the dramatic arts on the day. Also present at the opening of the Sight Centre (and rightly so, too) was a member of the volunteer audio description team which operates from inside a studio at Royal and Derngate.
It is a group of people which provides live commentary and description services to the blind and visually impaired while a performance is going on on stage.
Years ago I had a go at doing audio description myself. I lasted considerably less than one act and it is a wonder that nobody asked for their money back because it is an art form in performance itself.
It’s also another example of how the needs of people in a particular part of the community can be met, including them in something which those who have no impairment might otherwise take completely for granted.
The new Northampton Sight Centre is a state-of-the-art home to the Northamptonshire Association For The Blind for years to come.
It is more than that though; with its bright blue livery it is also a beacon highlighting the very existence of the charity.
An appropriately visual beacon.