As many of you will know, we now have installed and working an ANPR parking system at our hall. If you are a hall user parking is free. On entering the hall, please use the keypad and follow the prompt to enter your car’s registration number, and please remember to accept and confirm once you have checked your entry. Making a mistake or forgetting to register will most likely mean you will receive a penalty charge, which if you do, will require you to go through the appeals process with CPM.

Key holders: please ensure you are at the Hall to unlock it in good time before the start of your activity. Those who attend the event may well arrive early, and they may be penalised if they cannot register their vehicle because the organiser is late in allowing access.

Once again, we will be holding our Hall AGM on the 11^th of March in the small hall starting at 8.00 pm; please join us if you would like to see how YOUR HALL is run, or alternatively, you may have a question or request you wish to ask regarding our hall.

Saturday morning gardening dates are March 16^th and April 20th. Please join us if you can for an hour or two of light gardening duties, a chat, and refreshments.

Note from the Chairman

We were all so sad to hear of the recent passing of two past hall trustees, Graham Darby and John Kent, both were very good friends with myself and many of our hall trustees.

Graham was a trustee to the end, but with deteriorating health during the last two years wasn’t able to attend our hall meetings. Graham loved our new hall and was an integral part of the team that finally achieved our goal in 2016, helping to make it the success it is today.  Back in the late 90’s, Graham was Chair of the Platt Parish Appraisal designed to discover the hopes and aspirations of local residents from which a seed was sown for a new hall. Graham was a hall trustee for over 20 years and was a big part of the fundraising campaign started in 2001 to help fund the journey we would undertake. In our old hall, Graham spent many hours along with others on a rota system, spending time cleaning the old hall, including polishing the wooden floors which was very hard work. Graham produced two Village calendars during the fundraising years, and also put together the early business plan for the new hall, having to amend it on numerous occasions as circumstances and times changed. He chaired our subcommittee put together to research the history and names on our War Memorial, spending many hours on it, at the end there was a £50k funding offer from the Heritage Lottery Fund, which was going to enabled us to relocate our memorial, add more plaques, and more.

John Kent was a trustee for three years from 2001, very much a part of the early days of our journey with the feasibility studies and land search. When he left he and Pat were always on hand to help when called upon for the many fundraising events. John was also involved with fundraisers for a number of years and even the Village News team.

So many people knew Graham and John in our Village, they themselves being friends and golfing buddies.

We will most definitely miss them both.

David Vallance, Chairman of Trustees