How do you raise £1.3 million?
The Village Hall Fundraising Committee was appointed in 2012 and has been enthusiastically investigating all avenues to raise money ever since.
They have been investigating all available grant and charity relief options and several grants have now been applied for with some very positive results. In addition the Village Hall has been awarded £275,000 of Section 106 money as a result of the Alder View
development on Grove Road and £96,000 from Section 106 money from the Blenheim Hill development.
As we neared the end of Phase 1 we realised that whilst we would receive further section 106 money from more, newly approved
housing developments, there would be a gap between when we need the funds to pay the builder and the award – usually granted on first occupation of the new housing. Therefore, the committee looked to the Charity Bank and we have been successful in securing a loan for £350,000 which would bridge this gap and also cover any shortfall there might be. As of November 2016 we are now drawing down on this loan to pay for Phase 2.
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The success of the project has also depended very much on the support of Villagers and local businesses to follow in the philanthropic footsteps of those who started the Village Hall a hundred years ago, and help to provide facilities for the next hundred years. We have been blessed with several significant donations and been able to claim gift aid on many of them.
In-hall Events
The Village Hall Events Team has also been working very hard and over the past 4 years has put on over 45 events in the Hall, including film evenings, Murder Mystery Evenings, Musical extravaganzas, Easter Egg Hunts, raffles, an Auction of Promises and many more. Other groups and clubs in the village have also donated funds from events they have put on, e.g WI, Craft Group, Busy Bees Music, The Hart at Harwell, etc., and we have also had unfailing support from Bob’s Butchers in the High Street who sell almost all of our tickets for us!
To date we have raised over £670,000 from all these events, donations, gift aid and grants.