EMERGENCY STATEMENT
MOUNTFIELD VILLAGE HALL
To put it bluntly, without urgent action, Mountfield will lose its Village Hall and the Club will lose its home in approximately two years. The reasons for this are straightforward.
First, several groups who provided regular, bread-and-butter bookings did not survive Covid.
Secondly, it is clear that life will not be the same as before the Pandemic and business is not returning to pre-Covid levels — ask local shopkeepers or restaurants. And these social changes are affecting village halls too.
Without action now, Mountfield will lose its Village Hall and the Club will lose its home in two years
Finally, there is the rise in energy prices. Mountfield Village Hall was very lucky: our electricity renewal notice arrived about 10 days before the ‘Energy Crisis’ hit the headlines — and the renewal quote was for a cool 100% increase! Neil, our treasurer, managed to find a deal at only 70% increase but other halls have been faced with 200%, 300% or worse. Energy costs are the biggest single factor simply as a result of the scale of the rise and because they are beyond our control.
Neil recently spelt out the economics of the situation:
“Despite reducing maintenance, suspending capital investment and increasing prices, my current forecast for March year end is a deficit of -£4,400. Our total reserves then will be about £9,500. This works out to around two years left (i.e. mid-2025). However, the contract only freezes our electricity costs until December 2024 when they are likely to rise. And, of course, in the meantime, suppliers’ prices will continue to rise as energy costs rise.
“We have little or no room for further cost-cutting so we need to increase income but even matching our best ever hire figure of £8,444 (2019-20) would still only produce approximately £3.3k of extra income against the forecast annual deficit of £4.4k. To make up the forecast deficit would require an extra 24 hours hire per month at £15 per hour.”
That’s a tall order but not impossible. We know what needs to be done but we just don’t have enough helpers to do what’s required. To make things happen, we need more trustees and more for the Management Committee. But we also need volunteers who have any specific skills to offer such as graphic design, social media, marketing, painting, building maintenance, sponsorship deals, etc. And we also need helpers who can let a tradesman in, or show someone round; research local caterers or bouncy castle hirers; source grants for any particular projects; whatever — or to pour teas. And we can always use ideas. So…
… there will be a special meeting, in Mountfield Village Hall to discuss the problem on:
Tuesday April 25th at 7.30.
Please come along with ideas, offers to help, or just moral support. See you there.
Peter, Neil, Nick, Steve, Trish
(Trustees)