MINUTES OF HULLAVINGTON NEW VILLAGE HALL PROJECT GROUP MEETING
PRESENT: Bob Fenner, Jebbie Hewitt, William Harmer, Nick Hathaway, Victoria Castle, Maggie Bawden, Paul Hadley, Anne Durrant, Isobel Acott (representing WI), Helen Kemp, Mark Collard.
1. New Village Hall Project Business
1.1. Apologies: Dave Hunt, John Metters, Peter Parry-Williams, Joan Shaw, Julian Greenman, Brenda Saunders, Neil Hamilton.
1.2. Minutes of the last meeting held on 23rd March 2005 were agreed and signed.
1.3. Matters arising 1.3 - the minutes are now on the website
1.8 the request for volunteers on the village website has had no response.
1.4. Report on VAT payments Helen reported that her enquiries have shown that the new hall will definitely be zero-rated. The building materials will be zero-rated and the design costs may be too. Basically, everything that is not removable will be zero-rated e.g. a fitted kitchen will be zero-rated but we will have to pay VAT on a free standing cooker. If all the work is included in one building contract then only one signature will be required to exempt us from VAT. The VAT form is short and straight forward, anyway. Maggie pointed out that if the freestanding items are paid for by the PC then VAT is not payable. Bob commented that it may be too slow to make any payments through the PC.
1.5. Funding enquiries Mark has been researching grant possibilities. He reported that The Community fund has now disappeared for capital projects, and the Big Lottery Fund is being introduced but will not come on stream until autumn 2005. Several grant schemes are currently being changed and the timescales will make it difficult for us to apply, as the majority of schemes will not back fund once the project has started. The Landfill Tax Credit Scheme is still a possibility. There are several small funds that may be available to us, although many funding schemes are re-focusing and concentrating on social inclusion projects. There are funds available for environmental projects and we may be able to apply for landscaping around the hall and the car park. We will probably not be able to get a grant for installing the disabled toilet as it is a requirement of a new building, but extras such as a hearing loop may be funded. Maggie mentioned that the Malmesbury Group 1 Committee has funds available. Mark and Helen still have several funding bodies to investigate. These include: Awards for All, Lloyds TSB Foundation, Rank Foundation, Malmesbury Civic Trust, Rural Revival, James Dyson Foundation and Community Dividend Awards from the Co-op. Bob questioned whether we borrow enough for the whole project and then, if lucky enough to get a grant, pay back some of the loan. Maggie thought that we could only apply for awards once the building was going up. Paul commented that the hearing loop has to be planned for before building starts. It was suggested that grants could be used as a catalyst for new hall groups to form. William commented that there are people in the village who are willing to donate to a gift aid scheme. We are registered for receiving gift aid but it needs to be looked in to.
Bob thanked Mark and Helen for all their work.
1.6. Lease and Trust Deed
1.6.1. An e-mail from John Metters states that the solicitor has submitted the Albemarle application to the Charity Commission and he expects that we could get a response from them in around a months time.
1.6.2. Bob queried as to when we would start paying the ground rent; it may be that we would have to pay many months rent without having a building to recoup any costs. Bob will ask John to find out if it would be possible to delay paying rent until we have a building up and running. William thought it would be possible to sign the lease but have a later start date for payment. Paul wanted to know what index would be used to annually increase the ground rent.
1.7. Final design William reported that of the two main players, Terrapin has an almost final figure for the build, whilst Securaccom is not quite so complete. Comparing the 2 companies is not straight forward as the buildings are not identical with, for example, differences in cladding. To comply with PC standard regulations we need to find another 2 companies to quote and we need to ensure that a transparent scoring system is in place for choosing the preferred company from the submitted tenders. Paul informed us that in the Terrapin design the roof supports can be open but in the Securaccom design fire retardant materials will surround the roof supports. The Final Design sub-group has decided to exclude a concrete raft from the design specification so that any company submitting a tender may use either a suspended floor or a concrete floor so long as the specification of 7.5kN/sq.m load bearing is met.
1.8. Planning application whilst the project group could get a reduced rate for the planning application if going through the PC, it would involve more work for the group and could delay the project. It is thought that both Terrapin and Securaccom would do the work for us, but we dont know what the extra cost would be. We need to have an indication of this cost before deciding.
1.9. Overall Project Plan Bob presented version 2 of the project plan which is easier to read.
1.9.1. The priority tasks from the project plan are: 17 20, 23, 34 and 39. We need to identify 4 suppliers. Bob and Paul will start preparing the procedures for the tendering process. The car park resurfacing and drainage both Securaccom and Terrapin would need to find a contractor to do the work so it was felt we would be better off choosing a good contactor ourselves.
1.10. Draft business case Bob presented a business case taking into account the £1250 annual ground rent. Assuming, where relevant, an increase of 20% in running expenses and a rental income based on a 3 year average (with Pre-school), the % increase in rental levels needed to balance the books would be around 43%. This would equate to, say, £13 per session for the main hall and £8 or £9 for the small hall, for the user groups. The electricity bill for 2003-2004 was artificially low because of a rebate that year.
1.11. AOB There was none.
1.12. Date of next meeting Tuesday 24th May 2005 at 8pm in the Church
Ψ 7.30 8pm Hall AGM and election of committee and officers.
Ψ 8pm Hall Project Group meeting
There being no further business the meeting closed at 9.30pm.
There is a Community First Information day on Saturday 14th May at Kington Langley Village Hall on the implications of the Licensing Act 2003 for village hall responsibilities and business. If anyone in the group is able to attend and report back please contact Bob for further details on 837320.