A sad day for proud community champion Angela

A PASSIONATE community champion spoke of her pride at helping to get her community moving as a popular project came to an end.

Angela Cooper (59), of Active Dearne Denaby, said she had enjoyed working with the elderly, the lonely and mums and getting them more physically active in the area.

Angela started in 2018 at the project, which was run and funded by Yorkshire Sports Foundation and Sports England and was the go-to point for many in the area.

She said: “There was an idea to put community champions in each of the nine areas to get people more physically active.

“It was a community-led programme.

“It wasn’t us deciding what we wanted to put on — it was whatever the community wanted.

“The health walk was the first one I started on Monday mornings.

“I only had one person come but it gradually built up over time.”

Angela said she had asked her manager Paul Cummins if the group could spend some time having a tea after walks so they can get to know each other a bit better and this had helped the group numbers grow.

“I’ve a passion for the people of older generations, especially the lonely who feel isolated,” she said.

“I didn’t realise how important it was for some people — it’s quite overwhelming.”

Angela said each group organiser had done different things and she had also organised a dancing group which had proved successful.

She said: “My most successful was my dancing groups.

“It was just an idea that I got because the husband of one of my walkers lives with dementia and she is a full-time carer.

“The walking group helped them to keep him in a daily routine.

“They used to dance a lot, but Covid came.

“I got some funding and I just told her about the dance group.

“Just last week, I did my last dance for the year and we had 34 attendees.”

Active Dearne Denaby is now being wound up after the funding ran out.

Angela said it had been a “fantastic project” and she was proud to be a part of it.

She said: “It’s sad (ending) but we knew were only running so long.

“I absolutely enjoyed my time with it.

“I feel like I achieved what I wanted to achieve — but I think, without Covid, we’d have achieved even more.”