2024-04-05-accounts - Malmesbury Skate Park Group

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– Malmesbury Skate Park Group Registered Charity 1161210 Annual Trustees Report for the operational year 06/04/2023 to 05/04/2024

Statement Of Charitable Purpose.

In 2015 the charity was formed to keep the doors open and sessions running in the newly built indoor skate park facility in Malmesbury , Wiltshire. The local council were in a position of leaving the Riverside youth centre and thus the doors would have closed on the newly built skate park should a solution not be found to keep the park open.

A group of volunteers formed and began the process of starting the charity in order to take on independent control of the park and run sessions for all ages, sexes and all people regardless of their locality or background. That we would provide a safe location for action sports to take place within a set of a controlled supervised sessions.

The goals being:

Volunteers would open the park and run as many supervised skate park sessions as possible per week.
Volunteers would be first aid trained and liaise with the councils youth workers in order to provide essential support for the young people using the facility.
Volunteers would take on all repair and maintenance work in the park including some interior fixtures and fittings.
Volunteers would promote the park and Skateboarding within our local community as a healthy form of exercise and activity.
Volunteers would engage in a number of fundraising exercises to become self sufficient financially and take on the various roles of providing an income to secure the parks future.
Volunteers would manage the finances, income and expenditure to ensure we met our goals with long term financial security in place.
Volunteers would take on the legal elements of running a charity, to ensure adherence to the valid laws and regulations that support a charity within the UK.
Volunteers would comply legally to safeguarding and child protection laws/rules.
Volunteers would ensure all forms of licence and insurance were valid and in place.
Volunteers would support local schools, clubs, community groups, town council projects and sporting activities within the town in order to play an active role in developing our profile and thus gain awareness and support to our cause.
Volunteers would teach ,coach and train skateboarding to the park users. They would also support Skateboarding by taking an active role in the wider skateboarding community to promote a positive image.
Further increase our skate sessions, have more of an impact and presence in our local community and undertake more fundraising tasks in order to again secure the longer future operation and stability of Malmesbury Skate Park.
Engage with local music and arts festivals and organisations in order to work more closely with them for charity awareness and fundraising.
Digital marketing to improve, new booking system and class tracker to be investigated, tendered and provided for the park. For better record keeping, visibility on sessions and to allow for better online visibility and planning
Cost of living crisis - To continue to sustain the charity and its fundraising activities in the difficult environment in the UK at the moment. To stabilise outgoings, to try new methods and grant applications to ensure an income.
To support all volunteers through a difficult and challenging year, to provide guidance, mentoring and advice if needed to help from within.

Performance against these goals

The volunteer team successfully run an increased amount of openings per week. . All age ,genders and abilities included - 261 sessions run for the community including 885 bookings – a record!
All volunteers first aid trained and liaisons with the council youth work team took place regularly. Support given to all volunteers. New volunteers trained and on board. Team first aid training session focussed on life support and sporting injuries.
All repairs made and park cracks fixed ourselves to a high standard, no other repairs needed.
Volunteers coordinated with again with community meetings and groups in order to promote the park and its activities. Close links continued with our neighbours the Riverside community centre. Volunteers attended sessions with the school, the mayor and the police in order to help work in the community in tackling antisocial behaviour with positive mentoring activity again, this is an exciting ongoing piece.
Fundraising activity continued in the community with regular pushes for donations and support. The booking fee for online session spaces has proved a successful method of raising funds via the Classfit app.
The treasurer managed the finances very responsibly and an analytical approach to expenditure has ensured controls in place that make sure only essential spending occurs. The accounts and bank have been managed very responsibly ensuring reporting on this is most efficient. In 2023/2024 we have changed bank accounts and treasurer and this has proved very successful with much better admin via the Coop bank compared to Lloyds and greater visibility due to their better IT solution and app - they are also more geared towards supporting charities and so this has been a major improvement.
Compliance to all legal elements of running the charity and park has been a full team effort and documentation all in place to support our internal processes. Policies all maintained including new versions of child safeguarding and welfare policies – All stored securely on line and delivered to all volunteers to ensure education and compliance.
All volunteers have been security checked by an independent agency to support child protection rules. Child safeguarding processes are in place and we know our line of reporting should we have any concerns that need to be escalated. DBS all completed to an enhanced level.
All licences and insurances in place. Tender processes undertaken to ensure best value for money.
Volunteers have attended many community meetings and activities - Schools, council, youth work and liaising with other local sports groups has all occurred and helped promote the park, support the community and bring in more new faces!
Volunteers have mentored and taught young people skills on a weekly basis, we have also undertook limited travel to other skate parks with some of the young people in order to support and enhance their skills.
Despite some challenges within the volunteer team with some people losses the team regrouped, rerecruited and adapted to run many more sessions in this year than we did in the previous years. New volunteers recruited and trustee positions remain filled. The chairman undertook an increased amount of community liaison and work with the mayor, police and schools and this continues to be a strong part of the charities engagement within the Malmesbury community.

13. In July 2023 we fully achieved this objective by running a successful childrens workshop at the Womad festival, over the weekend we trained and coached over 500 children and received a huge amount of praise and support - this raised some money in donations, raised community awareness and awareness with all of the visitors to the festival. This will be an ongoing this we hope due to its huge success – We can also report this brought in more beginners to our regular coaching sessions at the park.

Digital marketing improved with lots of posts to social media, gaining an audience of over 1500 people on Instagram and Facebook. We continue to have to use Classfit as whilst it is not the best solution it is free and most competitor products will cost the charity money - so it’s a possible future objective when a better IT solution is found but not at the charities expense.
Cost of living crisis - During these difficult times again we actually raised more money than we spent which deserves a round of applause for the fundraising team - We have supported local families by keeping the childrens activities free of charge and so it’s a rarity to have this free resource in place for young people to learn and engage with many skills in a safe and supported environment.
Again the objective was achieved by the team helping the team, unity and morale is still at an all time high with an extremely supportive and hard working team in place. Amazing support network in place for volunteers and the wider community. We have seen this community support increase due to our activities outside of the skatepark supporting the local community, raising awareness , PR and marketing and of course having a large presence at the Womad festival which saw us delivering free skate lessons to 100s of children, not just local and so sharing our activities far and wide.

Un-audited Accounts For Malmesbury Skate Park Group – Registered Charity 1161210

For the period 06/04/2023 to 05/04/2024

Treasurer – Mr Stephen Dimbylow

Summary

Opening Statement £2455.35 Funds In £1545.47 Funds Out £1106.91 Closing Balance £2893.81

----- Start of picture text -----
Transaction Date Transaction Description Debit Amount Credit Amount Balance
05/04/2024 CLOSING BALANCE 2893.81
02/04/2024 Classfit payout 99.45 2893.81
02/04/2024 DBS Payment to Wiltshire Council 17.00 2794.36
25/03/2024 Private donation - Burts Boards 45.00 2811.36
01/03/2024 Classfit payout 108.29 2766.36
01/02/2024 Classfit payout 125.97 2658.07
02/01/2024 Classfit payout 198.90 2532.10
20/11/2023 Classfit transfer from old Lloyds account 367.76 2333.20
30/08/2023 Private donation - Womad 500.00 1965.44
07/08/2023 Private donation - J.Morris 100.00 1465.44
07/06/2023 First Aid Training 240.00 1365.44
18/04/2023 Park Insurance payment 849.91 1605.44
06/04/2023 OPENING BLANCE 2455.35
TOTALS 1106.91 1545.37 2893.81
----- End of picture text -----

        - 15 boards now on site for use.

The portable mini ramp was retained in good working order to use at external outside events, this will allow fund raising opportunities and demonstrations to raise our public profile. We have also been asked to possibly loan this out in the future which will secure more money for the park
More resources were acquired for building bigger ramps for public events and for repairing park equipment
- The park also has ample helmets and safety loan equipment in place.
  - First aid equipment provided and maintained on site.

Structure and Management

Stephen Dimbylow – Treasurer

Alan Holt – Secretary Matthew Wigley – Chairman

All trustee positions were agreed would continue into 2024/2025

Jo Morris, Rob Pattinson, Gina Tiplady, James Threlfall, Tim Hipkin (SBGB Coach) , Dale Peters ,Tom Burton , Charlotte Lyon , Chris Bratton and Stuart White would form the core volunteer/coaching team for the foreseeable future.

Regular drives for more volunteers will continue.

In conclusion again the Chairman would like to state that all of the years goals were met brilliantly and all objectives exceeded – AGAIN! Thanks to the hugely supportive team and community.

The Chairman would like to extend his thanks to the volunteer team and wider community in achieving all of the above again for another year.

With thanks to our volunteers, supporters and assistants for a successful 2023 and beginning of 2024

Un-audited Accounts For Malmesbury Skate Park Group – Registered Charity 1161210

For the period 06/04/2023 to 05/04/2024

Treasurer – Mr Stephen Dimbylow

Summary

Opening Statement £2455.35 Funds In £1545.47 Funds Out £1106.91 Closing Balance £2893.81