Dunchurch Dialogue Summer 2008

Dunchurch Village Hall

We are delighted to announce that Paul Smith has accepted the position of Chairman of Trustees. At the first Management meeting following the AGM, the two new Trustees, Keith Brushett & Nick Jones were welcomed.

The Hall is now over four years old & the Trustees considered it appropriate to seek from regular & occasional users, their opinion on using the Hall. The response to the survey was excellent, over 85% of those approached, returning the completed questionnaire. We thank you all for taking time to do this. The survey sought a view on the quality & adequacy of the Hall accommodation & services, which produced an overall result of over 90% satisfaction with the facilities. The strong areas were the kitchen & its facilities and the ease of using the hall. Some criticism was expressed about the toilets, the heating settings & controls, the external lighting & condition of the Annexe Club room. The Trustees will be addressing these issues. One or two people indicated an interest in being part of a user group and others were happy to send in a users report from time to time. Almost everyone supported the idea of computerising the bookings system. A proprietary software system for this has been successfully tested but a decision on this has yet to be taken. This is your hall and the Trustees are happy to receive any further comments about the accommodation & services if you feel they could assist in improving the facility.

The CCTV installation has been completed. This now provides surveillance around all of the buildings and across the car parks. The benefit of this is to counter potential vandalism on the premises and hopefully discourage further damage & bad behaviour in the future.

The Village Hall website has been further upgraded to include more information about what is going on at the hall. Details are provided of the regular activities during the year and a calendar for the current month showing all bookings made. The Trustees have also established a dedicated e-mail address on the website for making future bookings as an alternative to doing it by telephone – bookings@dunchurchsportsandvhall.co.uk.  Keith Brushett has now taken on the responsibility of Webmaster.

Those who regularly use the sports field for walking and/or exercising the dog(s), will have been aware of the water that has collected in the field during the rainy parts of the year, particularly during the winter months. The Trustees decided to attempt to improve the conditions for the future. Money has been invested in clearing the ditches and introducing additional drainage in the area of the football pitch where the greatest accumulation of water occurs. Other future development projects currently being investigated are the building of three tennis courts on the field and the purchase of an extension to the hall stage for use during pantomime and by such as the Dunchurch Silver Band for their events held at the hall.

Our Bookings Secretary will be retiring towards the end of this year and the Trustees are now seeking someone suitable to take over from her. You will find a separate advertisement giving details of the vacancy contained within this issue of the magazine. In the meantime Jenny Black continues her duties and for those wanting to book the hall should contact her by telephone on Rugby 522444 or now alternatively on the website at the new dedicated e-mail address given above.

John Chard