YOUR VILLAGE HALL
Culter and District Community Association is a charitable and voluntary organisation instituted in 1947 to operate Culter Village Hall which is owned by the residents of Peterculter. Culter Village Hall is totally self-financing and receives no help financially or otherwise from any Local Authority.
WHAT'S ON AT YOUR HALL
Playgroup Mon-Fri 9.00am- 12.noon
Playgroup Rising Fives Tue 1.00pm - 3.30pm
Mother & Toddlers Tue & Fri 9.30am-11.30am
Bo-Peep Mon 9.30am -11.30am
Kindergym Wed classes according to age
Socatots Thur 11.30am - 12.15pm
Play it again Fri 9.30am &10.45am
Dancing Classes Mon, Wed & Thurs classes according to age
TheatreClub Tue & Thursday 7.OOpm - 10.00pm
Yoga Thursday 10.00am - 11.30arn
Mah Jong Tue 7.30pm - 10.00pm
Ninja Tue & Thursday 7.OOpm - 9.OOpm
Bridge Club Fri 1.30pm - 4.OOpm
Carpet Bowls Mon 1.30pm - 3.30pm
O.A.P's Ist Wed of month 7.30pm - 10.00pm
W.R.I. 1st Thurs of month 7.OOpm - 9.30pm
For more information on any of the above groups please telephone Alison on 01224 734371.
HALL REPORT
THE AGM of Culter & District
Community Association was held on Monday 21 st March 2005. The following is the President's report, which details the trials and tribulations involved in maintaining this wonderful asset for our community. A 10% increase in rental charges was agreed, but groups who can show financial difficulties may present their case to the committee.
PRESIDENT'S REPORT 2005
I would like to welcome everybody to the AGM and thank you for giving up an hour or so of your free time.
I wish to start by thanking the hall staff - Corrine our cleaner, Zita and Rachel our wardens, and Alison the administrator. They have all worked very hard this year to keep the hall clean and tidy, and to ensure it is managed efficiently and trouble free. The hall continues to be reasonably well used with most of the regular activities carrying on. However we are still suffering from the loss of lets to the Karen Berry Dance School and also from the decrease in hours for the Playgroup. On the positive side, we have new regular lets from the Ninja training group and have just started Socatots. This past year we have had quite a few `one off' lets for special functions, which have helped considerably in keeping our income up, but as these are one offs we cannot consider them as regular and reliable.
Culter Theatre Club continues to use the hall two nights a week. Bo-Peep, Mothers and Toddlers and the Playgroup ensure the hall is utilised during the daytime. Yoga classes take place on Thursday mornings, Bridge on Friday afternoons and Mahjong on Tuesday evenings. Roller discos are still popular, as are children's parties. The new bouncy castle parties are also quite popular and Kindergym continues to provide us with a good income.
Luckily, we have had some life saving donations this year which have helped to keep us afloat
Gala funds £400
Camphill £20
Ladies Golf Club £50
Mother and Toddlers £400 (for the bouncy castle)
Bo Peep £15 (kindergym equipment) Playgroup £50 (kindergym equipment)
Val Street £5 (use of rails)
Pipeband £10 (use of tables)
TOTAL: £950 We thank these organisations for helping the hall to survive. I can also tell you that
the Theatre Club has recently given us a donation of £1,000 but this figure will appear in the accounts for 2005. We thank them for their generosity.
Fundraising this past year has been fairly successful
Cabaret £2033.50
CTC summer show £ 405 (fi-ont of house takings)
Table top sale £ 282
Pampering evening £ 200
Ladies Xmas night £ 552
Hogmany party £ 265.50 TOTAL: £3,738
GRAND TOTAL: £4,688
The inescapable fact is that without the donations and the fundraising, the hall would have to close. We could not keep up our service to the community. Also, our reliance on fundraising is putting unacceptable pressure on the volunteers who organise and run these events.
For the past five years my main concern about the running of the hall, is the dwindling number of active volunteers to help out at hall activities, and to provide input to committee meetings. I am happy to say that we have heard from a couple of very willing volunteers who, I believe, actually want to come onto the hall committee and help us keep moving forward. This is great news and I am delighted that we shall have new enthusiasm on the committee. I am certain that the loyal hard workers already on the committee will also breathe a sigh of relief. Most of the people here have been on committee for many years, and are also active in many other village groups. I especially wish to thank all those who currently give up their free time and work so hard to make sure that the hall provides the high standard of services and amenities needed in our village.
* This village hall is our responsibility.
* It is a valuable community asset.
* We cannot continue to grow and develop without the help of our volunteers.
We did manage to carry out some refurbishment in 2004. A new seating area has been formed where the counter was in the corridor, and the corridor walls were given a fresh coat of paint. Thanks to donations we were able to make a start on the upgrade to the ladies loos, and we now have new water heaters which ensure hot water at all times, and the sinks have been boxed in. There is still work to do and we hope to get it finished before the summer. This will include a new floor covering and a fresh coat of paint on the walls. My thanks go to all the painting and joinery volunteers and to lain Bruce who provided plumbing labour free of charge.
We have still not managed to afford the repair of the west end gable wall, which needs sealing and rough casting. This is a very expensive item and, whilst it is high on our list of priorities, its very expense makes it difficult to plan for. We have been told that the walls are not irreparably damaged due to the flow of water and that the wall is still weatherproof. The angle of flow from the pipe has been altered to ensure that it does not trickle down the wall but falls freely to the ground. It is for these reasons that we felt able to leave it a bit longer, coupled with the fact that we simply do not have the money to completely re-do that wall. We are now looking at repairing the patch which is affected as we are certain that the rest of the wall is alright. This is a much cheaper option and whilst it may prove to be false economy, we have no option but to keep our fingers crossed and hope it is not!
In conclusion, I wish to repeat my heartfelt thanks to all those on the committee who helped to keep the hall running in 2004. Without their hard work I am certain I would be announcing the imminent closure of our hall.
Susan Chappell-smith President CDCA
Editor: The Chair's Report was followed by the Treasurer's Report. It did not make for happy reading and was found to be very worrying, to say the least.