Published by Rothay House, Mayfield Road, Eastrea
Eastrea Village News No 18: April 2009
FENLAND REJECTS £1 million GIFT Many years of planning — and a pile of complex documentation over a yard high — have come to nothing. The plan for our village hall, designed for us by Ellis Miller, was rejected by the Councillors of the Planning Committee of Fenland District Council. Planning officers were very supportive of our scheme; we were even through to the final short-list for a £500,000 grant from the Big Lottery Fund. It would have added up
to a gift of a £1 million muchneeded community centre from the people of Eastrea to the entire district. The reasons for the rejection have already been reported in the columns of the Cambs Times. Fenland were told that the development was ‘not within the Development Area Boundary’. That simply is not true! The site for the hall (H on the map, below) is within the boundary (B, marked in red). Indeed, the hall is in Fenland’s ‘District Wide Plan’, which the same Planning Committee
published many years ago. The Committee were also told that the project would fill in the remaining space between Eastrea and Coates. This is equally false. The end of Eastrea (shown by a white line, below) lies far from the development, and the open roadside (blue line) remains untouched between the two villages. Surprisingly, Fenland District Council have decided to
omit the remarks from their Minutes of the meeting, though the Village Hall Trust are making sure that they are recorded. Our team are in touch with the Attorney General, the Treasury Solicitor, a London barrister from the Charity Commission, two planning solicitors, the Ombudsman, the Compliance Officer and the Standards Board! Watch this space for developments.
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Food (and entertainment) return to the Nag’s Head Fans of the Nag’s Head’s new kitchen have been suffering from withdrawal symptoms. What’s happened to our daily lunches and suppers? Villagers who are wasting away for want of decent home-cooked food will soon have the pub back in full swing. On 1st May, new management takes over. The team are Richard and Charlotte Hargraves, and they plan a full social programme at our village pub. Richard was born and raised in Whittlesey (though we won’t hold that against him, as we believe in welcoming people from foreign parts). For over eight years he has run Don's Club. At the Nag’s Head, Richard plans to have teams for contests including pool, darts and dominoes. His wife Charlotte has been running the catering at McCain’s for many years, and has given up her job there to seize the chance The Storers lunch for the senior citizens of Eastrea took place on 21st and 22nd April, to avoid a clash with the Tuesday lunch club. Pete Sennett (above) helped once again with the delivery of all the invitations, so many thanks to Pete from us all.
Raising Money for the Hall
to run the pub’s restaurant. The Nag’s Head kitchens are to be re-launched with tried and tested meals and bookings can be made by phone on 203333. The new management also plan to hold entertainment every week on Saturday nights.
As the picture shows, the 2008 Eastrea Beer (and Music!) Festival was a great success. Richard and Charlotte plan to hold the next event on the weekend of Saturday 18th July 2009.
KEEPING THE MONEY SAFE Do you realise that the total funds in the Eastrea Village Hall bank account reached £60,000? That is an amazing sum for a little village of about 300 homes. About £14,000 has been paid to consultants, architects, quantity surveyors, engineers, and planners to get us this far. Many committees expect to
pay a few thousand pounds per year for running expenses (like printing, etc). Even during the last few years of frenetic activity, ours have never been more than about £3 per week. The Village Hall Trust now has over £45,000 in the bank and has earned £500 more interest since our Business Manager, Geoff Turner, trans-
The Storers Grants for Students (and other Residents of Eastrea) Remember that any resident of Eastrea facing financial difficulty can apply for a grant from The Storers. All those matters are kept in STRICT confidence. And students — of any age! — can apply for a Storers student award towards the cost of their studies. All the applications are reviewed in the summer, and grants are released in September.
Newest recruit on the Village Hall Trust committee is Gareth Prentice (above), 16 year old stage management student at Peterborough Regional College. Gareth is registering with a fundraising site which villagers can use to make their online purchases. Every time you buy something online, a sum of money can be sent on to the Trust. The web page for these fund raisers can be found here: www.easyfundraising.org.uk and we’ll publish more about this scheme in our next edition.
These are an honour for students to receive, and are reported in the press (pictured right). To apply, send in a full c.v. with grades obtained and/or anticipated. Also enclose details of your spare time activities or voluntary work, and copies of all examination certificates so far obtained. You also need a letter of application and a supporting
document from your year tutor or head teacher, plus their phone number for the referees to make contact. We will also need to see your acceptance letter from the college where you’ll study. All application documents should be sent to: Clerk to the Storers, Rothay House, 6 Mayfield Road, Eastrea (phone 350 888).
ferred our account over to the Charities Aid Foundation. We are looking to see what we can do with the funds we still have available for a village hall. The extra project costs are already over £40,000 but all this has been provided free of charge to us by our project partners, Rose Homes. We’re very grateful to them.