Welcome to the latest feature in our Good Causes series where we highlight charities working hard in south-east London and north Kent.

This week we spoke to a charity called the Crystal Palace Community Trust based in Anerley.

Tell us about the work you do?

We are a community-based charity that operates for the benefit of people living and working in the wards surrounding Crystal Palace Park.

We manage Anerley Town Hall and the Kingswood Community Shop in Southwark. At Anerley we offer free and affordable activities for children and young people including an art club (weekly) and youth club (twice a week).

We also run a free bi-weekly club for the over 50s and provide discounted space to the Caribbean Lunch Club, the Citizens Advice Bureau and other services.

We also hire out spaces to cross-subsidise the costs of our community activities and services. Spaces for hire include halls, offices, meeting/training rooms and hot-desking.

Our ethos is to keep costs as low as possible, since our host centres are both situated in deprived areas of London.

This Is Local London:

Have long have you been doing it / how many volunteers do you have?

The CPCT have been in existence since 2004 and we have around a dozen volunteers working for us at any one time.

You have been given a new lease for Anerley library and funding of 150k – tell us about that.

Last year, we managed to secure a 40-year lease on Anerley Town Hall which includes the disused library space from Bromley Council. Since then, we have been consulting with our local community, partners and other interested parties to pin down the best ideas for the library space.

The idea to turn the space into a dedicated space for children, young people and families came out of this research and we carried out more consultation to drill down to the fine detail. Over 85 per cent of those surveyed said that more services and activities for children and young people were needed and over 50 per cent felt the current offer was in need of improvement.

We put in an application for funding to the Weston Anniversary Fund (Garfield Weston) for £150,000 and we were ecstatic to receive the news that the bid was successful.

This Is Local London:

How many people have you helped?

Last year there were over 42,000 visits from over 11,000 different individuals to Anerley Town Hall and that is not counting business centre visitors. There are 160 children and young people registered to our youth services of whom 80 are regular users; over five years that is around 600 different young people.

What are the biggest pressures for the charity right now?

Funding is always an issue. Anerley Town Hall was built in 1878 so the costs of maintaining such an old and large building are neverending. We are constantly trying to raise funding to keep our services going and keeping them free/affordable will always be a challenge for us.

This Is Local London:

How can people help or get involved with your charity?

You can become a member, a volunteer, a trustee. Support us and get involved. We also have a brand new Justgiving page on our website. All info on our website: www.cpct.org.uk