WTF

Received a response from the council.

On 1 February 2013 15:07,
Stringwell, Antony wrote:

Ewen
As I had promised, officers working in my team have visited the site and have produced a costed programme of work that will address the present barriers prohibiting the use of the Middleton Marauders site for the purposes of archery.

The capital costs involved, including fencing improvements, the introduction of lockable access gates, a storage container and additional fencing to secure the access next to the club house building, would be £8.5k. In addition we would anticipate a further cost of £1.5k in legal and surveyor fees to draft the necessary license document.

While I appreciate this is a significant capital sum I would be happy to offer the support of my team, who could offer guidance on available funding sources.

At this point I think it would be useful for you and I to meet so I can provide more detail the proposals I have outlined above.  Also, I would like to explore with you further the possibility of your club utilising the Middleton Leisure Centre site, which I think could facilitate the activities of your club both in the summer and winter. I would be grateful if you could please confirm your availability to meet in the week commencing the 11th Feb. I would be happy to meet in the evening if that would be more convenient for you.     In the meantime should you wish to discuss this further then please do not hesitate to contact me.

Many Thanks
Tony Stringwell

Anticipation

Today is the date where we expect to receive some news on the lease conditions for Marauders grounds. I'm very excited but trying not to get too carried away; the council have not been known for replying promptly thus far.

It would be really good to get some finality on this though. We've done a lot of work on the finances over the past week and we just don't have the one important factor of lease costs. When we do finally get the figures we can drop it into our spreadsheet and see what tumbles out. Until then.. We're shooting in the dark.

Hello World

Starting the ball rolling.

Letter to Councillor Kim Groves

Councillor Kim Groves

Kim,
Many thanks for the offer of assistance you gave at Saturday's Middleton Residents meeting.  I wanted to follow up quickly while things are fresh in my mind.

The grounds at Middleton Marauders is definitely of interest to me and I would appreciate any information you could supply regarding contacts or other help to follow up on it.  At Saturday's meeting, I spoke with the community representative who is handling the skate-park development as well as your fellow councillors and I was left with the impression that our use of the grounds for an archery club does not necessarily need to wait for any development on the community's current Marauders project; in essence, we could proceed independently.  That said, I think that we would both benefit if the plans come to fruition.  The archery club would have better facilities, inflow of members and the community club could benefit as we would be very keen to participate in community gala/have-a-go type events with them.

Regarding Marauders, I have some misgivings about the current state of the perimeter fence around the ground and also storage for equipment but if these could be resolved, I think there is a real and rare opportunity to be had for an archery club on the site.

Aside from Marauders, you had kindly offered to mail me a list/map of other areas that might be available for the sport of archery.  I would be very keen to investigate these as I have a couple of archery-related projects in hand that require suitable grounds.

As you suggested, I have also CC'd councillor Ogilvie, if you or councillor Ogilvie would like to correspond on this matter, please don't hesitate to email.

Many, many thanks
ewen