STRACHUR MEMORIAL HALL COMMITTEE AGM AND QUARTERLY MEETING 26th OCTOBER 2018

AGM

 

1. Attendees:

Executive: Patrick Gibb (Chair), Evie Campbell (Booking Officer), Douglas McHugh (Treasurer),

Sheena Dowse (Events), Alison Roy (Secretary)

 

Group Representatives: Ian Asher, Fiona Campbell (p.p. Susan Gaffney), R. MacKenzie, Cathy Montgomery, Marguerite MacKellar, David Fiddes (p.p. Anne Fiddes), Jackie Scott-Mandeville,

 

Other Persons: Iseabel Thomson, Mhairi MacIndoe, Arlene Stirling, Mary Thomson, Katie Wilson,

Douglas MacPherson,

 

Apologies: Catherine Harrison, Teresa and Les Earle, Margaret Asher, Anne Fiddes, Susan Gaffney, Drew Stewart, Frieda Bos, Gordon Neish

 

2) Chair’s Welcome: Patrick Gibb welcomed everyone to the meeting.

 

3) Minutes of the AGM 29th October 2017: The minutes were approved in January 2018.

 

4) Chair’s Report: Patrick Gibb reported that 2018 had been a busy year so far.

Last year the biomass boiler had failed and repair was considered to be too expensive. Then just before Christmas the oil boiler had also ‘broken down’. There were visits by A&D Watt but they had not managed to repair it. The boiler needed to be continually manually restarted. Fiona Campbell was instrumental in keeping the heating going and was constantly at the hall to do this. Eventually Douglas McHugh managed to get the boiler working. However the decision was taken to replace it. This also took a long time to arrange but now we have the new boiler installed which seems to be working well.

The tennis court has been refurbished mainly from grants applied for by Evie Campbell.

Fiona Campbell resigned in unfortunate circumstances after many years of working for the hall. We want to thank her for her commitment to the hall and to those using it.

Mhairi MacIndoe started as our new cleaner on 1st September. She is self-employed and started her contract two months ago.

The History Society is now established in its new room-the old Registrar’s Room. This had been latterly used as a toy library but unfortunately the mother and toddler group is no longer running. The toys have been temporarily stored away.

The Strachur and District Newsletter has been increased in price to 50p and numbers printed limited to 130. Each copy cost £1.30 to print. Advertising makes up the shortfall in income.

There have been lots of events in the hall although bookings have been slightly down-probably owing to the bad winter and heating problems.

Strachur Youth Drama and the community production of Peter Pan was remarkable and shows what the hall is capable of hosting. The preceding week saw a lot of scenery etc. left in the hall which was unavoidable.

We need to thank Douglas McHugh and Evie Campbell who have both worked tirelessly in their respective roles. Also thanks to Sheena and Gordon.

Patrick announced that this would be his final year as Chair.

 

 

5) Treasurer’s Report (Douglas McHugh): Thanks go to Heather Grier who has audited the financial accounts at no cost to the hall.

There has been a substantial financial deficit for the year with all the essential repairs etc. but the accounts strengthened towards the end of the financial year (June 2018). There were demands for capital items from the Fabric Fund but the General Fund remains steady.

Income is up slightly on 2017- advertising income from the Newsletter has improved. It now makes a slight profit.

The new boiler was a big item of expense but is efficient oil-wise. It has a warranty for a year but the rest of the heating system is old- radiators etc. Other expenditure went towards the multicourt refurbishment although the bulk of this funding came from grants.

There is a new contract with SSE.

The 50/50 club collected £1800 for the hall funds.

Fire alarm maintenance was necessary to replace a broken fire alarm button next to the stage. The maintenance charge is reduced to £200.

All invoices need to be settled promptly and please write your invoice number on the back of the cheque. You can also pay by BACS.

The financial report was approved and will be sent to OSCR. (Full financial accounts attached)

 

6) Other Reports:

a) Booking Officer: Evie Campbell reported that the current electronic method of sending invoices saved money and took less time than the previous conventional manner of printing and posting.

Hall users must check the invoices for accuracy. There had been 1,089 bookings this last year a slight decrease on 2017 when there were 1,114.

Most bookings were for local groups. There had been one wedding.

Groups need to email to book and if there is no reply contact Evie again. Also all groups are reminded to book for the winter as until confirmed the booking will not be valid.

b) Newsletter: Drew Stewart reported that there were no problems with the newsletter and thanked all the contributors for their articles and news.

c) Website: Frieda Bos informed us that the Strachur website attracts about 1,000 visitors a month. It is a very old design but could be upgraded to be mobile friendly. The website has a calendar and people can send local events for including into the calendar. The history society will get its own page. David Fiddes informed the committee that that was the 3rd website to be used by the Strachur Memorial Hall.

 

7) Appointment of Office Bearers:

Gordon Neish tendered his resignation from Events Officer.

Sheena Dowse agreed to stay as the other full Events Office- nominated by Jackie Scott-Mandeville

There being no application from the meeting for any of the posts (all available) – the resident Executive Committee was re-elected –proposed by Ian Asher; Seconded by Jackie Scott –Mandeville

 

Chair: Patrick Gibb

 

Vice Chair: Vacant

 

Treasurer: Douglas McHugh

 

Bookings Officer: Evie Campbell

 

Events Officer: Sheena Dowse

 

Secretary Alison Roy

 

Strachur Memorial Hall Committee Quarterly Meeting

Friday 26th October 2018

 

 

 

1) Attendees: See attendees for AGM Friday 26th October

 

2) Minutes from the previous meeting 31st July: Item 4 carried the amended minutes from the Executive committee Meeting 19th June.

The minutes were unanimously accepted.

 

3) Items Arising:

a) Memory Garden: There was no update on the progress of this. There is some heavy work to be done-it was hoped that the ‘Pay back’ team would help.

Margaret Marshall thought that £200 had been set aside for the Memory Garden but David Fiddes and Douglas McHugh has no record of this.

An application could be made to the Strachur and District Community Fund for help with this project.

b) Storage: Sheena Dowse asked if Drama could store costumes etc. in the ‘upstairs room’ which can only be used for storage. Permission was given on this understanding. The toys that are there will be moved temporarily to the ‘Dark room’ and later hopefully put under the stage.

Rita MacKellar suggested that the toys be sold and the money put into a fund for a future playgroup. As there is now government funding for children of three there aren’t enough younger children to run a group. Patrick said that storage of the toys had been at the request of Laura Cameron who is responsible for the assets of the playgroup. This could be reviewed at some point in the future.

Sheena Dowse has contacted Scooter for a quote to clear away the old container outside and to build a concrete base for a new shed/unit.

The orange chairs remain –cost £4 each or maybe free to a good home!

c) Tesco Bags of Help: We have been awarded £1,000 from Tesco Bags of Help. Another successful funding application by Evie Campbell.

d) Strachur and District Community Fund: Patrick Gibb applied to this fund for funding for a handrail for The Hub users. A grant of £500 was awarded for the project.

 

4) New Items

a) Meetings: How often should we have them? It was decided to keep to the four quarterly meetings a year with the Executive meeting between these meetings.

b) Cleaning Contract Extension: Mhairi McIndoe has now been working for the hall for two months and on the whole there has been a positive response.

She has consulted with Sheena on replacement of consumables and it was agreed that these were more easily ordered from Amazon.

It was agreed that the old cleaning schedules would be kept for a year-we may need them for the financial accounts. Mhairi is to send them to Douglas with her invoices.

The dishwasher fluids are now kept in the cleaning cupboard owing to their toxicity. Margaret Asher and Anne Fiddes are to be told how to access them if necessary.

Mhairi will wash the mop heads and dish towels weekly-just put them in the box supplied.

Mhairi asked for a long extension pole for dusting the high level beams.

It was commented that the floors were left wet after cleaning and that perhaps Mhairi could dry mop them to avoid slippages.

There was a comment that there had been a slight deterioration in the standard of cleaning but it was pointed out that Mhairi only has 7 hours to do her work throughout the week. It was proposed that she should be given an extra hour and her contract extended for the next year when there would be an annual review.

 

c) Does booking both halls and the committee room constitute “exclusive booking” of the whole hall? Bookings are made on the understanding that no one group should be able to disadvantage other hall users. The Community Hall has to work for the whole community. Annexing a part of the hall for sole use should not impact on those groups already there.

This discussion was raised between the Youth and Drama Club and The History Society. The Youth Club books all the available bookable halls on a Tuesday night between 6.30 p.m. and 7.45 p.m.to allow free play and movement of the children throughout the halls. The club feels that the presence of the History Society in its new room would compromise this and jeopardise its Safeguarding and Child Protection Policies. On the other side, The History Society want to be able to access its room at any time and is not prepared to compromise on this issue with the Youth and Drama Club.

At present, there is a general hall security issue as there is no security lock on the inner or main entrance hall doors to prevent intruders from entering. Rita MacKellar stated that after the Dunblane tragedy all public halls should have some sort of security system-e.g. a lockable door/key code entry to prevent intruders from entering. But locking the internal door could present a fire safety issue.

The hall (it is a charity and bounded by OSCR regulations) has a duty of care to safeguard users especially those considered to be vulnerable.

It was agreed to look at improving the door security but this still does not address the concerns of the Youth and Drama Club.

No resolution was found to the problem and the discussion will be continued at the next meeting.

d) Booking the kitchen: Sheena Dowse enquired about the possibility of just booking the kitchen on occasion. She was informed that the kitchen is a shared facility that there is no charge for and cannot be booked as a separate room.

e) Policies needed: Patrick Gibb asked the whole hall committee for approval on installing some basic policies- Health and Safety and Safeguarding of Vulnerable groups. It was agreed that the Executive would formulate and circulate these.

 

AOCB

a) Memorial Plaque Shelf: Douglas Macpherson agreed to modify the shelf so that it could be removed if necessary. The cost will be about £200.This was agreed by the committee.

The white curtains have been washed and Douglas also agreed to rehang these.

b) Finance: Final invoices for the multi-court have now been paid, thus reducing the Fabric Fund to £168.94, however we await the payment of a £1,000 grant from Tesco-Groundwork UK.

The General Fund balance is currently £7,005.79 with income from the 50/50 Club standing at £1,796 and some collectors still to return sales. The Newsletter has a slight deficit at the moment but overall the General Fund is in surplus for this year.

c) Fiona Campbell’s leaving gift: Ian Asher administered a collection for Fiona which resulted in a total of just over £166. This was presented to Fiona at the Community Council Meeting. Ian read out a very nice letter from Fiona thanking everyone for their contributions.

 

 

 

The next Strachur Memorial Hall Quarterly Meeting will be held on Tuesday January 29th at 7.45 p.m.

Subsequent dates for the Quarterly Meetings are: Tuesday April 30th, Tuesday July 30th and the AGM will be Tuesday October 29th all at 7.45 p.m.