Bookings
It’s good news. The MSC booking diary
has never been so full at this time of year
as it is now. Dances and parties galore,
with some pushed onto Friday evenings
thus displacing the Dog Trainers (Mis-
Fits), for which - many apologies to
Angela. It’s certainly a crowded diary for
this year. However, to avoid further
disruption of the enormously popular
Friday dog training classes, no more
Friday evening bookings will be accepted
this year.
New to Wickhambrook in the coming
weeks, and all in the MSC...
Saturday 8th March.
Clairvoyant Workshop (no. 1)
Sunday 9th March
Clairvoyant Workshop (no. 2)
Friday 14th March
Bury St Edmunds Concert Band
Saturday 19th April
Theatre Royal’s 2008 tour -
the comedy ‘ART’
Tuesday 22nd April
Ballroom Dance Classes for Beginners
(start of 10-week course)
There are more details about the
above activities elsewhere in this issue.
Also during the currency of this issue
there’s a ‘Charity Dance’ on Friday 28th
March (see posters for details).
The Farmers
Markets continue
on the first
Sunday in every
month - all year.
The next are
on Sunday 2nd March and Sunday 6th April.
These
markets are proving increasingly popular
and, with the Centre Café running
alongside (teas, coffee, light
refreshments) and adding something
aromatic to the atmosphere (bacon
sandwiches, hot dogs etc), the market
and café are established as the latest
venue at which to ‘meet and greet’ friends
and neighbours and plan the month’s
menus and gardening tasks. At this point
we must include a huge ‘Thank you’ to
Una who, by her generosity, has enabled
the café operation to go into early profit
and make real contributions to the hall.
Projects and Upgrades
Real progress. The décor in the Bar
Room has received many compliments
from the panto audiences in January and
the folk using the Farmers Markets. The
work will be completed when the bar
canopy is rebuilt and the bar area
equipped with up to date lighting.
Work on the Gents toilets may well
have started during March/April. There
will be some ‘inconvenience’, but not so
much as to cause panic.
Thanks go to the Players who took the
opportunity while using a tower platform
to install their panto lighting, to clean the
hall’s fluorescent light fittings and replace
several tubes and starters. And the clearup
after the panto has left the hall in good
condition with much rubbish cleared from
under and on the stage and the lighting
gantries cleared of surplus lamps and
loose cabling.
The hall is now largely fitted with
economy lamps. Not a cheap
changeover, but the payback periodestimated to be less than 3 years. And it
shows a responsible attitude to current
climate concerns. Thoughts turn to how
the Main Hall could be re-equipped with
economy, and perhaps dimmable,
lighting. The management committee
would welcome any ideas for that. There
are no plans to undertake major work in
the Main Hall during this calendar year, but it is never too early to collect ideas.
Finances
More good news. Recent reports from the Treasurer show a healthy situation which will allow the present urgent upgrade work to continue, albeit rather cautiously. The Chairman’s use of eBay has been a real cost-saver. It is hoped that for the next Scene issue, a simple guide (should that be a simpleton’s guide? - ed) to where the money goes, may be prepared in time for the next Scene issue. Watch this space.
Vandalism
Not so good…Sad to report serious vandalism to cars during the New Year’s Eve revelries. Local kids by all accounts, with hundreds, possibly a couple of thousands of pounds of damage done.
Health and Safety
Mixed news. The new Accident Book is being brought into use in April. It provides confidentiality of personal information for anyone recording an accident. Please use the book for any accident - no matter how trivial. It’s the responsible thing to do. You do the hall management no favours by not recording an incident. From a splinter requiring little more than TLC to a major incident requiring the emergency services, it should all be recorded. It's a condition of hiring and using the hall that this insurance requirement is met. The Accident Book is kept, on view, in the kitchen. We passed a recent inspection by an
Environmental Health Inspector, who
could only find a couple of things to criticise regarding food preparation
areas. All went well until he discovered
that there had been an incident (or two)
of smoking in the Pavilion lounge. That’s
a criminal act and a matter for the police.
So it’s been taken out of our hands. The
hall’s management has done all it can
(‘covered our backs’, you might say) to
ensure that the new national smoking
ban is fully advertised within the building,
despite the inconvenience to smokers
(and to the hall’s management). But
someone has decided to put our village
hall at risk by deliberately breaking the
law. Vandalism by the local louts is one
thing. But deliberately putting volunteer
committee people at risk of a £2,000 fine
and losing our licence to operate the
MSC as a village hall is simply not
acceptable within a village community. All
we can do now is keep everything
crossed and await the outcome.
Admin
Something for everyone.
Administration is not
usually a ‘hot and
interesting’ topic worth
reporting on, but several
changes are afoot. As a
result of the 2007 Risk
Assessments, the routine Safety and
Maintenance inspections of the field and
building over the past months, and a
consultation with the hall’s insurers, a
number of responsible management
steps are being taken this year to meet
new and existing legislation, good
practices and common sense. Some of
these are:
1.We are re-stating and enforcing the
prohibition on electrical equipment
being brought onto the premises which
cannot show evidence of having been‘Portable Appliance Tested’ (PAT)
within the previous 12 months. To help
everyone to meet this legal obligation,
we propose to purchase the necessary
PAT test equipment so that electrical
items which hirers wish to bring onto
the premises can be tested locally,
quickly and economically. It’s an extra
burden on everyone, but we hope to
make it easy and relatively painless.
More on this in the next issue.
2.Clubs using the premises will need to
have Fire Marshalls appointed. Exactly
how that can be operated in practical
and real-world situations is yet to be
examined. The Players have given a
lead on this with their clearly stated
restrictions on access to Dressing
Rooms during performances (Child
Protection) and the completing of an
attendance register to meet the Fire
Regulations. They have shown that,
with hirers’ goodwill, it can be made to
work. Now this will have to be applied
more widely in some practical form to
meet the current legislation.
3.Mains powered smoke detectors are to
be installed. This is not an originally
approved project and is yet to be
costed and put to the Trustees for final
approval, but it is noted in the building
Risk Assessment and, in the spirit of
responsible management, it must be
done. It is not thought that the
detectors will necessarily need to be
linked to the fire alarm system, but they
may have to be inter-linked to give wide
area warnings.
4.The intruder alarm system is to be refurbished and brought back into
general use with local bells and sirens.
This will have a significant impact on all
hall users’ entry/exit procedures and it
will add considerable additional
commitments on the hall management.
But again, the management would be
less than responsible if the hall were
left without at least the automatic
monitoring system in place and
working during the ‘quiet hours’.
5.Additional emergency lighting was
identified in the Risk Assessment as an
additional sensible safety measure in
the event of total power failure. Three
locations have been agreed. Two
additional lights have been installed in
the stage area. The third will be in the
bar area when the canopy lighting is
installed.
All the above is just a sample of the
world in and around the MSC. If you
could help in any way with the admin, the
running, the organising, the inspections
and maintenance or any aspect of the
management of the building and
recreation field, please make contact. We
have an active management team, and
we enjoy ourselves at meetings and while
out and about doing whatever needs
doing - but there are rather too few of us.
The next management meeting is on
Monday 3rd March 2008. The next
Trustees meeting is on Monday 7th April
2008. Both start at 7.30pm in the MSC
Pavilion lounge. You’ll be welcomed at
either - just to sit at the back and see how
we do it. Or to join in the discussions - but
only if you wish to. We’re quite informal.
And you’ll be guaranteed free tea/coffee
and biscuits.
Supporters Association
The best news to report this month.
Mention has already been made above of the Centre Café. Here we report that
during one Sunday morning the
microwave oven in the hall’s kitchen died
- in a spectacular manner. To the rescue
came the Wickhambrook Charity
Fundraisers who, at the MSC meeting
immediately after, offered to replace the
oven with a new and better one - to be
purchased as a gift to the hall. And that
new microwave oven is now installed in the kitchen. So we say ‘Many Thanks’ to
the organisers of that Wickhambrook
based charity activity and, not to spare
their blushes, those thanks go
specifically to Linda Newell and Roz
Clarry. With the goodwill of people like
Una, Linda and Roz, our hall is safe in
this community.
MSC Booking
A summary of the MSC booking diary
entries is sent out by email, whenever
there are significant changes, to anyone
who would like to keep in touch with
what's happening and when, in and
around the MSC. It is sent as a Word
attachment (so it is easily printed off if
preferred) and is kept down to 'one side
of one sheet of A4'.
If you would like to be included in the
group of people who receive this, please
send an email with 'booking diary summary' either in the
Subject line or in the body of the email.
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