Working towards to a welcome

Another meeting.
Following up my blip of six months ago about our scheme to offer some Syrian families the chance to settle in our community. 
We had hoped that the first of them might be arriving about now but the procedures required to win Home Office approval have proved extremely time-consuming. As a community group operating independently of the local authority, we are something of a test case although a scheme of this sort has been running successfully in Canada for a number of years. 
The areas we have to cover include securing and equipping a suitable ;property, fund-raising, preparing a language teaching program to be conducted by skilled personnel, trauma awareness training, safeguarding training, recruiting interpreters, raising public awareness and producing introductory material about our town for the newcomers. For the last I've been describing and taking photographs of local amenities, streets, shops and so on in order that the family selected will have some idea of where they are headed.

 Doubtless there will be more hoops to go though and now it looks as if it will Spring before we welcome our first arrivals in person. We are still in the vanguard of the community sponsorship scheme and others groups following suit will benefit from our path-finding. As Aleppo descends still further into the hell of earth it has become the least we can do is to provide this chance to a few who have escaped Syria to find their feet again somewhere safe, if unfamiliar, and we have to demonstrate that our support system is watertight.