How we make Grewelthorpe Village Hall a warm and welcoming space

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This week we’re celebrating Village Halls Week (23 – 29 January) – a time when we recognise the vital contribution that village halls and community buildings make to our communities. This year’s focus is on how halls make their spaces warm, welcoming and inclusive. Here, Deborah Hodges, Chair of Grewelthorpe Village Hall, tells us how they’re doing just that.

Grewelthorpe Village Hall is a lively hub at the centre of the Village. Our volunteers provide a huge range of activities for the local community, as well as putting on events which attract visitors from further afield.

We pride ourselves on offering a ‘warm welcoming, inclusive space’, in a variety of ways:

Hackfall Cafe is entirely volunteer-run:

  • It is a friendly, welcoming place with a delicious menu of mainly homemade goodies, such as soup, cakes, traybakes and scones (including the widely acclaimed Hackfall Scones, made with wild garlic from the woods), with paninis and sandwiches also available. Everything is sold at very reasonable prices. We operate on a not-for-profit basis – all proceeds going back into the upkeep of the hall.
  • Once a month, our volunteers provide a two-course community lunch, at a very affordable price. This enables people to get together for lunch, with friends and neighbours, without having to travel any distance.
  • The Cafe is a great place to feel connected to the whole community. New people in the village and the surrounding area, make lasting friendships there. Residents who are less mobile or who have health difficulties, can rely on a helping hand to come for a coffee or lunch. And, our volunteers find they have a regular and enjoyable opportunity to use their skills and talents.
  • We welcome young people to our volunteer team, and are keen to offer work experience opportunities, either as part of the Duke of Edinburgh Award programme or as an introduction to the world of work.

Other activities:

  • Our Cafe Talks are thriving. We have a huge pool of local talent and expertise, which we exploit on a monthly basis!  Everything, from lovingly restoring a Grade 2 listed house to riding for the disabled, farming in Romania, walking up Mont Blanc, cycling from Landsend to John O’Groats … and much more! The speakers give their time free of charge, and we ask for a small contribution from the audience, which includes a glass of wine or a soft drink. It gives the community the chance to spend an evening in a convivial group, being entertained by one of their neighbours. All proceeds again, go back to the hall.
  • Clubs and Societies:  National groups, such as the British Legion and the WI meet in the village hall, at concessionary rates, but we also have a growing number of local societies:  Knit and Natter; Book Club; Art and Craft Group; Music Appreciation; French and Spanish Language Classes;  Gardeners’ Club; French and Spanish Art Talks.
  • Fundraising events are crucial to our survival, in these tricky times. For example, we are lucky again, to be able to rely on our very successful music events, which are incredibly well supported. The organising team have brought some great artists to Grewelthorpe, and continue to do so!
  • The Big Village Quiz makes a welcome return this month too, having been a casualty of COVID 19.  Again, all volunteer-led, and accessible to the whole community.

Grewelthorpe Village Hall relies on the support of the local community, and on its energetic, dedicated, talented team of volunteers. We are also delighted to see visitors to the village. Lots of walkers and cyclists can be sure of a friendly welcome in the Café, with plenty of information and advice available on Hackfall itself, and other places of interest.

Please visit our recently updated website, which is project-managed for us by two of our volunteers, for more information.

Together, we believe we make it a ‘warm, welcoming and inclusive space’.

Celebrating our village halls

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This week we’re celebrating Village Halls Week (23 – 29 January) – a time when we recognise the vital contribution that village halls and community buildings make to our communities. Community First Yorkshire trustee, Jan Thornton reflects on how village halls and community buildings have been central to her life.

It is hard to imagine what my life might have been like were there not a village hall or community building in the village where I was brought up or currently live in….

As a young child, my first years at infant school were in an old building, which subsequently became repurposed for community use when the new infant and junior school opened in the late 1960s. I remember subsequently attending dancing classes there and also Brownies and Guides in the church hall.

My husband and I, as a newly married couple in the late 1980s, moved to the village where we still live. The village hall has been central to my life within the community ever since and barely a week has gone by in over 35 years where I haven’t been taking part in one activity or another there.

It has been the venue in which I have volunteered, worked hard (!), made friends and met up with neighbours. It is a great space to participate in and feel part of the community in which I live. I am very lucky: our village hall was newly built with a grant from Sport England only a couple of years before we moved there. It has been well maintained and ‘kept up with the times’ over the years by the volunteer village hall committee, so that it is still an attractive and warm place to visit and a delight to spend time in. It is so important where possible to manage a community building in a sustainable way so that it can continue to be an attractive venue for community use. Cold, damp and musty halls are hard to visit and support!

Obviously it is much harder this year than ever before to manage energy bills for community buildings. Energy advice is available on the ACRE website. There is also information available on how to apply for the Rural Community Buildings Loan Fund which is managed by ACRE on behalf of the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) which helps community buildings fill temporary gaps in funding, either for specific projects or for urgent work connected with the building. Last year, government announced a new £3m Platinum Jubilee village hall improvement fund, which will provide grant funding over three years (to 2025) to support capital improvement projects for village halls, such as installing Wi-Fi, extending buildings and modernising facilities, with 125 village halls set to benefit.

At Community First Yorkshire, we provide practical guidance and rural advocacy to trustees, employees and management committees of rural community buildings. Support is available on a range of topics including: good governance; safeguarding; finance and funding; policies and procedures and operational good practice. If your hall needs some improvement, there is advice and support on funding opportunities available.

Finally, a big thank you to everyone who manages and maintains rural community buildings across Yorkshire.  It is a significant responsibility but so worthwhile for the life enhancing richness they provide to those who live in your community.

#VillageHallsWeek

I’m not talking to you anymore, Mr Blackbird

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I have an allotment. I love my allotment; I was lucky enough to get it just before lockdown and it provided a great place to go when there was no-where to go. Being in the open air and close to nature after a day’s work is a brilliant way to relax and let my mind wander after hours of intense concentration.

In June, some of the birds get very brave and come close whilst I’m weeding to find bugs and worms for their young. Last week a blackbird came so close I grabbed a worm in my hand (gloves on!), held it out, and waited very patiently for it to come and take the worm out my hand. It hopped within inches a few times and fluttered away, but the third time he snatched it, flew a few yards away, pecked it once, then flew onto my strawberry patch, and you guessed it, ate my first ripe strawberry of the season!

I leapt up and scolded him as I would a naughty child. How dare he?! I’d just given him a lovely fat, juicy worm but he rejected that. Maybe, like most of us, he has a sweet tooth/beak. Needless to say, I immediately netted the strawberry bed.

The next day I went to the allotment and was passing the strawberry bed when I saw Mr Blackbird’s Mrs in the strawberry bed. I was incredulous! How did she get in there? I tried to un-net a section to allow her out but she squawked her way up to the other end of the bed and escaped though a tiny gap.

I thought I’d safeguarded my strawberries but it made me look afresh at my netting technique. I went round the bed tightening and weighing down the net so there were no gaps.

How are the safeguarding procedures in your Village Hall? Are there any gaps? Do you need to “tighten your nets” to ensure you are protecting those most vulnerable?

If you want to make sure your netting is secure, come along to our online Community Building and Village Hall network meeting on Wednesday 25 January 10am – 11:30am where we will be exploring what trustees should know and do regarding safeguarding in village halls. There will be a chance for you to ask questions and share good practice with others in a similar role .

I also recommend looking at our  safeguarding resource, which provides a checklist for essential and good safeguarding practices in your organisation.

 

Hilary Ashton, North Yorkshire Development Officer