2022-12-31-accounts - Burtle Village Hall

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Burtle Village Hall - Chair’s Report 2022

OVERALL, VIEW OF THE YEAR

2022 was an extremely challenging year for Burtle village hall!

The Burtle Village Hall committee has found 2022 to be an extremely challenging year as they grappled with balancing work commitments with the voluntary work needed to keep the hall itself and it’s finances in good condition.

While we were able to hold various events for the local community, getting help from within the local community had been challenging and certain planned events had to be cancelled due to a lack of available resources.

Thanks to the hard work of the committee though, we were able to put on a number of wonderful events at the hall, which raised some much needed funds as well as allowed the local community to come along and enjoy themselves at the hall.

The Burtle Village Hall Management Committee continued to hold monthly meetings at the half, and it was so nice to hold the AGM in April 2022 face-to-face after the last few years saw disruption caused by COVID-19.

This year’s AGM saw several new committee members voted in, including:

Chair
Deputy Chair
Treasurer
Hall Manager
General Committee member

All have settled well to the Committee bringing different strengths and expertise.

The BVH still have a few rental groups. It was lovely to welcome back groups and to see the hall being used again. And we were able to hold several social events and was wonderful to see villagers and friends enjoying these events. We held another welcome event at the hall, as well as the continuation of the ever popular and long-standing monthly Saturday Café Burtle as well as the Macmillan Cancer Support Charity coffee morning was also held during the year. With the devasting loss of Her Majesty the queen, we were able to open up the hall for the local community and we provided some light refreshments so that they could view the state funeral and pay their respects in the company of others from the village. We also managed to hold an extremely successful Christmas market in December, which also saw the popular Burtle Silver Band play some wonderful Christmas music.

The financial situation continued to be worrying throughout the year, especially given the increasing utility costs of running the hall, which as seen monthly electricity costs jump from and average pf £80 to £250+.

Treasurers Report

2022 has been quite a difficult year for the Village Hall, with organisations still coming back slowly to use the hall and the costs to run the hall increasing by over 22% year on year. The main increase coming from the electricity charges. I did manage to obtain a £150 credit, which was very much appreciated. I anticipate costings will stay the same for the new financial year. BANKING – the internet banking system is now up and running and is much easier to administer for all the income and expenditure of the hall. The bank balance at the end of 2022 was down year on year by 12%. With the signs of new bookings and the general return of organisations will hopefully ease the worry the situation – as it cost approximately £12000 to run the hall

BVH FINANCIAL POLICY – The committee updated their financial policy.

CASH BOOK – I have simplified the cash book to make it as transparent as possible. It means you can now see monthly how much it costs to run the Village Hall.

I am stepping down at the AGM in April after nearly 3 years being the treasurer for the hall. I am pleased to say that the accounting procedure, new internet banking, new main suppliers have all been changed and is much easier to administer. I am also pleased to say that a new Treasurer has been recruited and files will be handed over prior to the AGM.

I could not have done my small part of contributing to the running of the hall, without the strong teamwork of all the other loyal and dedicated Committee Members

I will make public the accounts once the external auditor has signed them-off.

I have attached the latest calendar year cash-book to this document

cash%20book%20% 20BURTLE%20JAN%2

Financial Strategy

A formal Financial Policy which set out responsibility for the prudent management of Hall funds. It is the objective of the Burtle Village Hall Management Committee to maintain income at a level which ensures that basic running costs are met – this is approximately £12,000 a rise of over £2000 since last year. Finance is an item on every monthly Committee meeting agenda and monthly statements are produced for each meeting – transparency is considered very important. All invoices for payment are now brought to each monthly committee meeting and authorised. The Treasurer then sets up the payments with Unity Trust Bank but does not make the payments. There are four signatories with the bank and only when two of these four - randomly selected – have authorised payments electronically are the payments released. This gives protection to the Treasurer but also keeps the whole

committee informed of income and expenditure throughout the year. This system continues to work well. I would like to sincerely thank Jim Murray for all his hard work managing the banking system.

Behind the scenes this year there has been a considerable amount of work to maintain and improve the Burtle Village Hall, paid partially from the reserves built up from prudent housekeeping over the preceding years.

Maintenance & upkeep of Hall

Regular maintenance of the hall infrastructure and internal facilities was undertaken including.

Regular monthly maintenance checks on the internal and external areas of the hall
Regular running of the water system (taps and toilets) to help keep the system fresh.
PAT testing of all electrical devices to maintain safety standards.
Annual servicing of the Air Conditioning, Burglar Alarm and fire alarm system
Fire extinguishers and fire exit lighting
General external ground maintenance – hedges, weeds and rubbish collections
Rodent control within the loft area and external locations
An ‘A’ board has been purchased for advertising hall events and will be secured on the forecourt of the hall.
Internal commercial floor mats have been purchased in order to reduce damage to hall floor.
Regular dedicated hall cleaner has maintained the hall, toilets and kitchen areas to a high standard.
Two of the vehicle bollards have been removed from the front parking area reducing the potential for vehicular damage.
A large BBQ was purchased for hall usage and is stored internally, the gas bottle is not stored on site.
Changes in electrical sockets in the bar area now have a facility for usb charging.
Areas of issues
Hall Clock – an electrician examined the clock and found the fleece used for insulation within the loft had wound around the internal mechanism causing damage.
Loft insulation – this is deemed ineffective due excess rodent damage and contamination, which will need to be addressed.
Heating controls – due to the nature of the system installed in the hall, we are unable to remotely activate the heating control prior to an event, unless this is physically done by a key-holder.

Hallmark is a nationally recognised Quality Standards scheme for village halls. It recognises good quality of management administration and practice and ensures compliance with legislation relating to community buildings. The Burtle Village Hall Management Committee had achieved Hallmark One and Hallmark Two accreditation in July 2019. In addition to

these Awards, Burtle Village Hall was also surprised and delighted to receive the ‘District Hall of the Year’ for Sedgemoor in 2019. The Management Committee applied for Hallmark Three early in 2020 but due to the Coronavirus pandemic, all visits and assessments were cancelled. The application stood for 2021 when external validation resumed where we achieve Hallmark Three in July 2021 – we continue to work hard as a committee to ensure that the hall is kept at this level.

Burtle Village Hall Bookings Secretary Report April 2023

Following several difficult years due to Covid, the hall began rebuilding bookings again in 20222023.

The hall continued to be used weekly by long term local user groups including:

Burtle Silver Band

Burtle babies The Longs The Parish Council Cafe Burtle The Community Coffee Morning The Harvest Home

Regular user groups such as Tor Cycling Club and returned this year, and we also engaged some new user groups, including a local band, Maestros Pizza and the Fish and Chip van, who now have a regular fortnightly slot at the hall.

Other bookers included private functions, birthday parties, rehearsals and practices for dance/music Somerset Wildlife Trust and craft events.

The hall committee organised multiple successful events too, including a summer BBQ, a resilience themed open evening, Halloween bingo, Christmas market and carols, Gin Tasting and Canapés, ‘music from the movies’ evening with the silver band

The hall also played a key role in jubilee celebrations, working alongside the harvest home to deliver a weekend of events.

Event promotion

The committee worked hard to promote events across more channels, including the newsletter, the email list and in local publications such as the polden post. Physical materials such as posters and an A Frame sign were also used. A new FB page for the hall was established to promote events too.

Challenges

the hall, like many other organisations, has struggled to rebuild engagement following covid, although this appears to be shifting now, with a gradual increase in booking enquiries. We hope this continues longer term and

Hire pricing still felt challenging, as many users/potential users commented that hire was too expensive for them. Compared to other village halls, BVH is slightly more expensive, although facilities are larger/newer

During the winter, the cold weather and an issue with the heating impacted bookings, but this was addressed and resolved.

Acknowledgements

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the BVH 2022 Committee members for their continued support, especially as most have extremely challenging and full time jobs, as such any little piece of volunteering work they do on behalf of the hall is extremely welcome, and I do appreciate all of their hard fought efforts.

In particular, I would like to thank Jim Murray and Beth who are leaving the Committee at the AGM in April, although both will still be around to help and support. They have both served on the Committee for two years and have each given many hours of their time and much expertise. Jim has excelled in his role as hall treasurer and Beth as vice chair has simply been wonderful in her support to the half – Both have also stepped in numerous times to help me in the running of the hall, as have all of the committee members during 2022.

The Burtle Village Hall would also like to thank Maureen, Jenny and Zac for running Café Burtle and to thank Heather for running the Community Coffee Shop. Let’s hope we have a continued run in 2023.

The Burtle Village Hall Management Committee would like to thank the residents, family, and friends of Burtle for their continued support of the Hall. The majority of Hall bookings come from the Parish and local clubs, organisations and individuals who either live in the village or have links with Burtle. Unlike many village Halls, Burtle Village Hall does not receive regular grant support towards running costs and has to be self-supporting.

The Burtle Village Hall Management Committee also acknowledges the continued advice and support received from the Community Council for Somerset (CCS). Once again in 2022 we have appreciated the guidance, help and support of both ‘Action with Communities in Rural England’ (ACRE) and CCS – this has taken the form of numerous emails and information sheets with updates as the situation constantly changed.

Finally, I wish to announce that I will be stepping down this year as both Chair of the Burtle Village Hall Committee as well as committee member of the hall. It has been an honour to help support the hall over the previous three years, but work commitments make my ability to carry on as art of the committee extremely challenging, so I have made the extremely difficult decision to step down at the April AGM.

2023 will I am sure continue to challenge the hall at a financial level, but I have every confidence that we will see a new influx of committee member join us in April to replace those that have worked so hard and done so much to support the hall.

I am also sure that the hall will continue as the social hub of the village, and I also hope that we will see the hall return to a more secure financial footing in order to run the Burtle Village Hall without the financial pressures of the last three years.

Ieuan Day – Chair Burtle Village Hall