AGM: Saturday 3 September 2022
Report of the Trustees
Despite ongoing Covid, a security breach at the tree nursery, and recent drought, it's been another good year for the Tree Musketeers. We've seen a gradual return of volunteer numbers at the tree nursery, we've restarted work sessions on the last Saturday of the month, we now have established watering teams operating in many of the parks, and our trustees are working well together. We recruited Stephen earlier this year and he has brought his much-needed professional financial expertise to the team and allowed Annie to relinquish the accounts. Our relations with the Council, and the trees and parks staff, are extremely positive and that all helps in getting plans agreed and in pulling together to keep trees healthy. It also helps with funding; we have just been promised £15k from the Council's Streetscene budget for the coming year.
We had some fantastic planting sessions over last winter working with Hackney Council tree officers, park user groups and local volunteers (and Mojos Chai Wagon which provided free hot chai!). The weather was generally kind to us although planting sequoias on the marsh in Storm Eunice was quite challenging! We started using Eventbrite to advertise planting sessions but also to get a sense of how many people to plan for; this has been a real help in knowing which sites to push and how to get the logistics right.
Park trees planted over the winter of 2021/22 included 13 trees on Hackney Downs; 7 on Daubeney Fields; 8 on Haggerston; 16 on Mabley; 9 in St. John's Churchyard; and 12 on Stoke Newington Common.
Trees were planted on estates and other green spaces including: 10 in Yorkshire Close; 5 at Woolstone House; 2 on Trowbridge Estate; 2 at The Mount; 3 in St. Martin's Close; 1 in Follingham Court; 1 at Gadsden House; 1 in St. Thomas's Place; 1 in Standard Close (east bank); 1 in Osbaldeston Road, 1 on Mapledene Estate; 1 at Pitcairn House; 1 at Clayton House; 1 in Chatham Place; and 3 at Loddiges House.
In South Millfields six standards were planted in December (including two memorial trees). Then in February we planted hundreds of whips and small trees behind the electricity sub-station. Two planting days were organised to create a small woodland, with a mix of native and nonnative trees, and a willow coppice area. Two classes from Rushmore school, one each in the morning and afternoon, the Mayor, Cllr Woodley and MUG volunteers joined in the planting on Thursday 10 February. Two days later, a community planting day with around 100 local volunteers completed the task. Over the two days 500 whips and 260 willow rods were planted.
In addition the TMs and Council staff planted 20 dawn redwoods, 20 coastal redwoods + 50 whips, and 30 giant redwoods to create sequoia groves across hackney marshes. A further 21 trees were planted including more redwoods, and black and Lombardy poplars.
Altogether 1029 trees were planted. There were 91 varieties planted and 72 species. 24 green spaces were planted. This was a major achievement. However, we discovered that we had spread ourselves too thinly and although lots of volunteers did provide valuable help the pressure on a few key individuals was too much. Therefore, this coming winter we will not seek to do less planting but to plant more trees on fewer sites. This will reduce the organisational strain and give key volunteers more space.
Orchard work was also carried out in several parks including Springfield and Millfields with a mixture of pruning, weeding, guard replacement, and mulching being done by local volunteers with a TM leader. Unfortunately we don't have enough TM leaders to do more of this work.
Watering this summer has been a challenge because of the drought and intense heat but watering teams have been out in the parks on a regular basis and our trees, and some Council planted park and street trees, have been kept healthy for the most part – the exception has been whips planted in South Millfields and some of the sequoias on the Marshes which have struggled. Each park site has a WhatsApp group notifying volunteers about watering dates and times links can easily be forwarded to anyone wanting to get involved. Goupi, our electric vehicle, has also been utilised in parks and green spaces where a water supply isn't available or convenient.
All is well at the Tree Nursery. The propagation polytunnel has been very productive and it is full of young seedlings. General maintenance of the site continues although watering has taken up most of the time through the summer. Recently we have been watering up to five times a week with just one hose. This is a big job and we are now looking at applying for grants to install an irrigation system in the next year. The tree nursery is hosting our Our Open Day which on Sunday 18 September which is an opportunity to show off all of the excellent work we're doing. One of the highlights will be The Mayor opening our new, accessible, compost loo which is being built by Jim (apparently The Mayor likes opening new loos!).
A lot of work has been going on outside of tree planting including hosting different groups at the tree nursery, walks and talks at the tree nursery and in parks, speaking at external meetings, workshops and events. These include Flee's work with local schools, planting and watering in parks, making seed bombs at the tree nursery; Annie hosting Hackney Ark at the tree nursery; Annie, Eugene, and Marcelo leading tree walks on Hackney Downs, in Millfields and at the Springfield Park festival. Marcelo made a presentation at an event at the Garden Museum while Christine gave a talk to the Women's Institute and Eugene to U3A (University of the Third Age). Marcelo set up pruning workshops at the tree nursery. Jim and Flee are organising a Tools Repair Workshop in October which is currently being advertised. And lastly we maintained our Green Flag Award status and were recognised as a winner of the Community Green Flag.
Sadly our bee hive died in early Spring. The last of the honey is still being sold at the tree nursery. Tim will be mentoring Loic to restart a hive, with Loic eventully taking over beekeeping at the tree nursery. The forest garden continues as an experiment to understand what edible plants can be successfully grown under trees.
We now have a good team of drivers for Goupi which has meant that every planned outing has been covered. We also now have a number of trained first aiders sufficient to ensure that there should be someone present at all planting and tree nursery work sessions. The trustees have also spent some time this last year putting in place more policies and processes to improve governance; this was long overdue but also a condition of our grant from the Council.
At the moment discussions led by Meghan are going on to develop strategic plans post Covid for the future of TMs including issues such as recruitment of more volunteers, broadening diversity, how to respond to requests from corporate organisations, more sustainable accommodation at the tree nursery and such like. All volunteers are welcome to join these discussions. We have started this process by restarting Last Saturday of the Month sessions, and commissioning some work on the website to make it more accessible, more informative and more interactive.
As trustees we would like to end with congratulations to all of us who have helped make the last year so successful. There is so much behind-the-scenes work that goes on to keep the tree nursery turning over, to keep the trees healthy, to plan and organise planting sessions, to raise money and keep the finances in order, to prepare policies, to keep Goupi running, to sort out meetings, marketing, the website, training, events..... there is so much that needs doing and it's all done by us, all volunteers. We all deserve each others thanks and a big pat on the back!
HACKNEY IIiEE PEOPI,F. CIO Rele[ed Chanty Null]1 (E & W) _ 1168716 Statement of Assets & Liabiliti • at 31 ma 2022 2021 Cash Aslets Cash ai bank 27.471 Cash in hand 134 283 39,774 27,754 Other Monetary Assel 73 A¥¥ets Malned for ihe dwrfty'$ own use Goupil G3 eleLifLC tnjck purrhased 2&420 £lJ,GOO, at IO% deprecisiLiun 14,040 15,frfXJ Llabllltlej Cheques lo dear J97 Independent examIon fee 420 Approved on behalt OI ihe Thee5 on 3 SopremI&T 2022 chr1ste King& Chair Annie C[da$¢ Treasutw (2021-22)
Registered Charity Number (E & W) - 1168716
HACKNEY TREE PEOPLE CIO
Receipts and Payments Accounts
| 2022 | 2021 | |
|---|---|---|
| £ | £ | |
| Net assets brought forward | 27,754 | 31,974 |
| Receipts | ||
| Grants | 15,500 | 15,000 |
| Donations | 4,880 | 9,749 |
| Tree sales | 1,037 | 1,338 |
| Trees sponsored | 350 | 300 |
| Plant & shrub sales | 112 | 152 |
| Crop sales | 37 | |
| Beekeeping sales | 30 | 291 |
| Hire of equipment/site | 400 | |
| T shirt sales | 45 | 103 |
| Calendar sales | 50 | |
| Miscellaneous | 232 | |
| Total receipts | 21,991 | 27,615 |
| Less total payments (next page) | 10,368 | 31,835 |
| Net Receipts (Payments) for year | 11,623 | (4,220) |
| Net assets at 1 April 2021 | 27,754 | 31,974 |
| Net Assets at 31 March 2022 | 39,377 | 27,754 |
HACKNEY TREE PEOPLE CIO
Registered Charity Number (E & W) - 1168716
Receipts and Payments Accounts
| 2022 | 2021 | |
|---|---|---|
| £ | £ | |
| Payments | ||
| Site & Equipment | ||
| Horticultural Supplies | 2,350 | 562 |
| Tree Nursery Site Maintenance | 372 | 629 |
| Vehicle maintenance | 36 | |
| Equipment maintenance | 789 | |
| Equipment purchase | 1,748 | |
| Hardware goods | 608 | |
| Security & safety | 1260 | |
| Vehicle purchase | 15,600 | |
| Insurance – Vehicle | 825 | 876 |
| Insurance – site & activities | 218 | |
| Activities | ||
| Volunteer provisions | 262 | 153 |
| Walks | 750 | |
| Event & walk leaders & tuition | 8,550 | |
| Schools | 438 | |
| Tree Nursery Biodiversity | 319 | |
| Grow Wild project | 283 | |
| Beekeeping | 142 | 115 |
| Forest garden | 77 | |
| Publicity | ||
| Website & social media | 208 | 187 |
| Publications printing | 184 | |
| Publicity materials | 15 | |
| Support | ||
| Administration | 26 | 19 |
| Information resources | 57 | 85 |
| First aid training | 680 | |
| Accounting | 430 | 420 |
| Mediation | 2,880 | |
| Sundries | 15 | 35 |
| Total payments for year | 10,368 | 31,835 |