Leigh on Mendip Memorial Hall
Annual Report
2006-2007
30 September 2007
The Managing Trustees present their Report for the year ended 30th September 2007, which should be read in conjunction with the separate Statement of Accounts for the same period.
The trusteeship of the Charity
was transferred from Leigh on Mendip Parish Council to the Hall Committee on
the 22nd of October 1996. The Parish
Council remains Custodian Trustee of the Charity. The Charity Commission number is 304574.
The Trust is established to
provide and maintain the Village Hall for the benefit of the inhabitants of
Leigh on Mendip without distinction of political, religious or other opinions
with the object of improving the quality of life for the inhabitants. The Hall
is available for hire by any individual or organisation in accordance with the
standard hiring agreement and scale of charges adopted for the year. It is intended that the scale of charges be
sufficient to generate enough income to meet the ordinary expenditure incurred
in providing the Hall. Significant
improvements are funded by specific appeals, fund-raising and grants. The Management Committee is elected or
appointed on an annual basis, with the officers being elected from the
membership of the Committee. The Annual
General Meeting is usually held in November.
1) Maintenance etc: The major item this year was not strictly maintenance, namely the removal of the electricity pylon and the re-routing of the supply underground with a view to building an extension on that site next year. Minor items included repairs to the upholstered chairs, tidying up the fence boundary and at our usual spring clear up giving the inside windows and paintwork a good clean, as well as the outside frames, plus clearing out and repairing the guttering. The outside windows themselves are cleaned every few months by a paid window cleaner. On the equipment side we have now bought the fire extinguishers rather than renting them and took delivery in the summer of a new water heater paid for by the Parish Council. Finally I would like to thank Gill Baker for doing such a good job as always in keeping the tubs looking colourful and attractive.
2) Bookings: Rather a case of swings and roundabouts as we have lost the Wednesday afternoon Short Mat Bowls sessions but do have a new regular dance practice booking on a Friday, in addition to the one which runs on Sunday mornings. We are used by several regular hirers such as the WI, Parish Council, Toddler Group, Art and Yoga Classes and the Short Mat Bowls which still runs on a Tuesday evening. We are planning a computer course in the New Year for beginners and improvers and have been happy to provide a venue for many one off or yearly activities in the village such as the recent Fols Christmas craft fair and many other school, church and even Rec Field events.
3) Fundraising: The Quiz this year was run for the first and probably the last time by Glen and Venice Baron. They did a great job and we were hoping they would agree to do it on an alternate year basis with the Worleys but as most people in the village know they decided for some strange reason they would rather live in Greece instead! The Village Fair this year raised a fantastic amount for each group and the joint effort in the refreshment tent by the WI and the Hall committee was again very successful with Gill Baker and Ann Orpwood taking the lead, assisted by their other halves and helpers from both village groups. We had planned a concert with the Big Band in October but had to cancel due to various factors not least the rather unexpected clash with England in the World Cup Rugby Final, we hope to re-arrange for Feb/March 08
4) Personnel: I was extremely pleased when Brenda Wigmore agreed to act as our new booking clerk at the start of the Hall year and am glad to say she has settled very quickly into what can be a quite complicated and time consuming role. We were also pleased to welcome Marsha Read as Parish Council rep in place of Ty Schlechter in their regular re-allocation of posts and I would like to thank Ty for his positive and valuable contribution while a member of the Hall committee.
5) Other items: Keeping the car park free of permanently parked cars to leave space for our hirers is an on going problem which we seem to be on top of at the moment and I am glad to report the situation with the light at the side of the hall being regularly broken also seems to have calmed down, fingers crossed this will continue.
6) Future plans: The extension: I am pleased to report that Mendip and Somerset have approved our grant application in principle although they cannot confirm this until their budgets are finalised at the end of March. We were very grateful to receive a pledge of 10% (up to a maximum of £4,000) from the Parish Council and we have a good balance in our own funds to put towards the project. We hope to go ahead with the building of a two room extension in the summer next year, 2008, providing much needed storage space and a small committee room. We will still need to find approximately £4000 to fund this, (we estimate it will cost around £36,000) and hope the village will support us with any fundraising we do next year to this purpose. Any outright donations would be wonderful of course!
The separate statement shows the current state of the finances, which the Committee consider satisfactory. The Bankers are HSBC Bank plc, Frome and the National Savings Bank.
The members of the Committee during the year and their appointing body if appropriate were:
Name Office Appointing body
Gill Baker W.I.
June Brewster Key Holder
Sue Cambourne
Keith Cockroft Treasurer
Roger Orpwood
Brenda Wigmore Booking Clerk
Ty Schlechter resigned Parish Council
Marsha Read Parish Council
Sue Vaughan Chair, Secretary
We also thank John Phillips for his input.
Our constitution allows for up to 6 members representing other groups plus up to 8 non representational members giving a maximum of 14 but also allows us to co-opt a further 2 members if required.
Approved by the Committee
26th November 2007
Chair/Secretary
Sue Vaughan --------------------------------------
Treasurer
Keith Cockroft ----------------------------------------