CCA AGM and Meeting November 30th 2022
AGM
Minutes from the previous AGM have been published on the CCA website (www.caerlaverock.org.uk) for the last year, no issues noted.
Chairperson’s Report 2022
I am pleased to report on another year of Community Association Business. It has been one where I feel we have emerged from the hibernation of Covid and slowly the community has come back to life. We have been fortunate to have a full year of meetings and whilst progress has been slow on some of our projects it has been made nonetheless.
Whilst we were able to distribute a few Christmas gifts around the elderly last Christmas a dinner meeting was not thought wise.
During the year I have had a number of meetings with D&G Council in relation to the Playpark upgrade and we have committed in writing to our £10,000 contribution. I had hoped that we would have plans on the table to consider by now but changes in the procurement process have delayed that but it is due to start imminently. I will revert to the Community for a view on the proposals when we reach that stage.
Improvements in the surface at the Quay End were completed before the spring when we levelled with stone with the help of the Brown family and Dougie Anderson. After a summer of use though it does not look like we have done anything and this will need revisiting.
In June, on the weekend of the jubilee celebrations, we held our Community Sharing Picnic. Whilst I could not attend, it was a great success. My thanks go to all who organised this, to the Barbour Hall Committee and the allotmenters for making their space available. My question for you is whether this should be an annual event aside of any public celebrations?
The summer brought the cycle event on which I know there are mixed feelings. I only hope that those who did visit the area in consequence return to the benefit of our community and businesses.
Throughout the year we have welcomed numerous visitors to the area, and the motorhomes have provided our income. This is our only source of funds without which we would be unable to finance any of our projects. Whilst, again, I know this subject splits opinions the fact remains that what we have in place was agreed between the Estate, the Boathouse, the Nith Hotel and Caerlaverock Community Association. That is, we cannot control what happens but we can try to influence behaviours and limit numbers during the day. Our Financial Report will contain more data but it is worth noting that since we introduced the envelope system in May 2021 almost 1,000 have been completed one. These show that approximately 524 people have visited the Nith Hotel, a similar number The Boathouse a massive 900 the Castle and over 400 WWT. The benefit to local businesses is clear. Above all we have nearly 100% positive feedback of their experience in our community.
Finally, on 13 November we remembered those who paid the ultimate sacrifice for the freedoms we enjoy today with a service at the Kirk and laying of wreaths at the memorial. This was followed at sunset with piping, the reading of the names, and lighting of the beacon. Since we began this on the 100th anniversary of the Armistice I am pleased to have seen the numbers attending grow and hope this will continue to be the case. My particular thanks to Ronnie and Helen Clark for their contributions and Struan who played the pipes superbly.
As our year draws to a close I thank everyone who has contributed to making this another great year for Caerlaverock and particularly to the Committee for their support and our Ward Councillors for their help.
David Gilbert
Chairperson
FINANCIAL REPORT
Next year’s budget is very similar, £5000 plus 5% leeway. Some items have been saved on IT costs (removing paid services to a similar free version). DG notes that IT costs are for purchased items and services. Malcolm Laurie and Jane Baxter who maintain the CCA website are volunteers and do not take payment for their time and services. A new load of stone chips will be needed for the Quay End, and a ride-on mower will help in the maintenance of the common grassed areas in Glencaple.
Rob Wells resigned his committee post earlier in the year. Thank you to Rob for his help to the community over many years, and he will be very much missed on the committee. Wayne McDonald joins the committee. All other committee members remain in their post.
AGM CLOSED
NORMAL CCA MEETING
Apologies
Apologies. Gerry Donnelly, Lynda Anderson, Rob Wells, Mark Fogden, Suzanne Macintyre, David Turnbull.
Minutes of last meeting – noted a request to slightly amend a point related to cycling events. Minutes accepted.
Financial position, for the quarter – [August to November 2022]
Thanks to Chris and Alison for looking after the accounts.
GENERAL REPORTS
No community police present. Honesty Box broken into on Quay End, funds taken would have been minimal. Theft of heating oil from farm at Conheath corner. DG would like to be able to discuss with community police, and hopes that there will be a police representative at the next meeting.
D&G COUNCIL
Malcolm Johnstone invited all to check the D&G website re the local development plans. This includes the Ladyfield proposals.
Douglas Anderson asked about what is happening with the 20MPH speed limit in Glencaple.
MJ and Chris Woodness replied that a timeline should have been done, but has still got to go through various processes to get here. Latest update from Roads dept indicates December.
Ronnie Clark raised subject of potholes. 4 times a lorry has been present, but has left without any progress. MJ responded the Council budget includes a complete review of roads expenditure, and images of the potholes will have been looked at and send on to the relevant department.
NATURE.SCOT
Suzanne McIntyre, Nature Reserve Manager sent the following summary:
“Not much to report from the reserve side, few Pink-footed Geese around so it has been very quiet, though they may be starting to build up again. We have completed three Avian Flu surveys since beginning of November and found no signs as yet, fingers crossed. We have heard reports of whooper swans dying from Avian Flu further north at Sanquhar and Glasgow, but no deaths here and only one sign of a sick swan at the WWT that seems to have recovered. We will be continuing with monitoring over the coming weeks.”
CAERLAVEROCK ESTATE
The estate reported to DG before the meeting that there were no material matters to pass on this time around.
CAERLAVEROCK PRIMARY SCHOOL
Summary from Gordon Tennant,Principal Teacher:
There is not much going on at the school just now, apart from the fact it’s Christmas and there’s only 4 weeks left!
We will be at the Barbour Hall Craft Fayre on Saturday, and the children have been designing Christmas scenes for the competition the Barbour Hall committee are running.
We are having our on-line Christmas Advent Calendar again, -this will be on the community website where people can go on and click on each door as the number’s countdown to Christmas, and behind each door will be some pupils doing Christmassy things!
(see www.caerlaverock.org.uk/adventcalendar-2022 )
Our Christmas Show is on the night of Monday 19th Dec at the Barbour Hall, at 6pm. We are just awaiting numbers from parents before we send invites out to the rest of the community, as I feel it will be well attended and there is a maximum capacity for the hall. It will be a ticketed event, but tickets are free.
Last day of term is Friday 23rd December.
BARBOUR HALL
EVENTS
It has been a busy few months at the Hall with numerous events aimed at getting the community together and providing entertainment as Winter approaches. Events have included three films, a MacMillan Coffee Morning, a Halloween Fancy Dress disco for lifeboat funds, a MacMillan Coffee morning and the now established and very popular traditional music session on the first Sunday of each month. There has been a visit by the Fish and Chip van to coincide with the showing of Top Gun and a sell out visit by the Pizza Wagon. This Saturday the Hall is hosting its annual Christmas Fayre from 10-11.30. The hall will be packed with a variety of stall holders and will have the usual tea, coffee and festive treats and a raffle. Please come along and support this ever popular community event.
FACEBOOK AND WEBSITE
You can follow what’s happening at the hall on our Facebook page and our new website (www.barbourhall.co.uk)
POST OFFICE
A reminder that the Barbour Hall hosts a Post Office service every Tuesday and Thursday from 2.30-4.30. It saves a trip into town and is an important provision for the community that we would encourage you to support.
MEMBERSHIP OF THE BARBOUR MEMORIAL HALL SCIO
Everyone in the Caerlaverock area over the age of 16 is entitled to be a member of the Barbour Memorial Hall SCIO. Our charity is a two tier charity which has a Board of Trustees and a general membership of people from the community. You can apply for membership by completing a simple form and the trustees will approve your application at their next meeting. As a member you have some important powers:
- Attend the Annual General Meeting
- Appoint persons to serve on the Board of Trustees
- Make changes to the constitution itself
- Request a special members’ meeting to, for example, change the constitution or to ask the Board of Trustees to do something or take a particular step.
Your membership is also important to us because:
- It demonstrates to funding bodies that we have the support of the community in what we are trying to achieve.
- It gives you the opportunity to support events you are interested in without committing yourself long term to the SCIO.
- It helps to bring the community closer together
BARBOUR HALL: PLANS FOR THE FUTURE
A lot of hard work is going on in the background to seek to upgrade the hall and make it a centre for the local community that is modern and a welcoming place to use. At present we have a draft business and funding plan and an architect is working on drawings for the possible future improvement of the building. We hope to hold a public meeting early in the New Year to share and discuss these plans with you.
More details on www.barbourhall.co.uk
NITH INSHORE RESCUE
Laurie Irving is now Chair, with Gwilym Gibbons as Treasurer and Natalie Parker as Secretary, with two more people supporting them.
The Halloween Dance held at the Barbour Hall was a great event, raising over £1000 for the lifeboat, to be put towards a new vehicle. There will be an Open Day in 2023, details to follow. There are now 22 crew on the lifeboat, and it costs £30k to run it, so all the support they can get is appreciated.
A First Aid course for young people in Caerlaverock is planned, bookings should be started soon.
Laurie will also confirm if a Shore Clean is planned this year, CCA will support.
CAERLAVEROCK KIRK
[To follow… ]
HUTTON HALL
Kelly Green noted that the hall is up and running after COVID, and regular bowls and ladies evenings are upcoming. They want to use the hall for meetings, and a community hub, and a heat hub is planned.
There is no Senior’s Christmas meal this year because of funding issues but there will be a Christmas Afternoon. CCA will send £200 towards this. Kid’s event will follow, with Christmas Carols.
Claire Clarke is working with ML to produce a website for the hall (which is now published on www.huttonhall.org.uk.)
AOB
David Smith from Hutton Trust:
The activities on the trust have been quite quiet over COVID, but are getting back up to speed. The Hutton Trust is set up to provide grants for young people in the area to help with tools, materials and books who are undertaking apprenticeships or training. What they need are candidates – young people in some sort of training capacity – to get applications in and be considered for trust grants. The money needs to be spent on these things or else funds get subsumed by other bodies.
GLENCAPLE PLAYPARK
Isla Roberts has been working with DG, procurement process is at a standstill just now, looking to put in place another procurement programme, and find another route. Local councillors were asked if they can help push this forward.
WWT
David Pickett (Site Manager at Caerlaverock WWT) informed us:
The visitor centre is not going to be a café as such any more as impossible to keep it going in a positive financial way. It has made a loss for some time, so will be providing hot drinks and pre-packaged snacks, but not the range of hot foods previously offered.
Avian Flu: Barnacle Geese have dome back, the count was slightly better than expected. About 30,000 have returned, with the difference at 25% less rather than about a third which was expected. This is reasonably good news. Like Nature.Scot they are monitoring along the tide line for any dead birds to be sent for testing.
MOTORHOMES AT GLENCAPLE QUAY
Concerns raised at the last meeting about vans assumed to be without their own toilet facilities on-board. The question was asked – where did they go if they needed the toilet? In response, DG has asked the council to keep the local toilets open 24 hrs a day. Toilets are now open 24/7 subject to monitoring
(Note that several volunteers monitor and maintain the grassed areas in Glencaple and have not witnessed any human waste in the area, but regularly clean up after dog poo being left.)
GRASS CUTTING
A ride-on mower is proposed to help with the grass cutting at the Quay End, which can also be used on the Community Allotments. Procurement of a suitable mower is underway thanks to Doug Anderson.
WAR MEMORIAL
This is looking well kept after the professional cleaning done and is kept weed-free by CCA volunteers. If anybody is passing by and sees it needs some weeding or leaves needing cleared, please can you take a few minutes to help. The hedge is maintained by D&G Council.
30mph Signs in Shearington
As there are two more houses in Shearington, the 30mph sign should be moved out past them. Councillors present were asked to help action.
LADYFIELD PROPOSALS
Master planning for developments as a whole going through processes and consultation. DG went to last meeting – noted not concerned with political side, but his concern was about the access for this community in Caerlaverock for accessibility of traffic, and possible flooding – caused my more water going into the Nith River further upstream. DG was advised the flooding would not be a problem as there would be a “net benefit” (no details of how this would be).
The proposals of dealing with traffic could be problematic, as the master planning could include chicanes on Glencaple road and raised tables. DG opined they need to think more about traffic side of things, how many more vehicles would be added to the already congested roads at times. There are upcoming meetings, and those present were invited to make their own representation at them.
CYCLING EVENTS IN CAERLAVEROCK 2023
Lee Seton Leisure, Culture & Wellbeing Manager and Ian Barr Council Events Officer were invited to talk about future cycling events running through Caerlaverock next year.
These would be the UCI World Championships, 13 events all held in Scotland.
D&G would be hosting 2 of these, one of which would be the ParaCycling Races and Time Trials to be held over 2 days (9th and 10th August 2023) and is proposed as a route through Caerlaverock.
Lee noted that the route from the Crichton, down the B725 to Glencaple, up Quay Hill, left at the War Memorial and back to the Crichton on the Bankend Road was a change to the previous route in 2022. The gradients and turns on this route mean it is suitable for para-cycling athletes.
This route would leave more access for residents as could enter the area from the southern end of the B725.
Both Lee and Ian spoke of the exposure and possible benefit to D&G and Scotland of hosting these World Championships.
Because of various community and business concerns last time – DG sent a note out to all local businesses and organisations and invited them to let them have their responses before we debated this as a community. There were also notices on noticeboards and websites/Facebook inviting the community to come and discuss at this meeting.
DG Read out the responses from his note to business and organisations. All apart from two were negative and were not supportive of future cycling events.
In general, the community present was not supportive of a future cycling event, raising concerns about access for people with elderly parents, or care access. The farming community will be especially affected having an event at this time of year.
Helen Clark asked if everybody objected, would the event still go ahead. There was not a definitive answer. Ian Barr noted that this was not a council event, and the routes were still being identified by the cycling body.
It was noted by Kelly Green that although her business had to close for a while and work late, the children that were there had a great time watching the event, and opined that we should take a positive approach and the Council should try to work with people here to make sure it works for all.
The general mood was that although D&G might benefit, people here in Caerlaverock were unlikely to, and some will suffer badly because of these proposals.
DG noted that the businesses and organisations here were not supportive, and as an agricultural area the farmers and their contractors would have this as a serious problem. While it might be great to watch it all there are local businesses paying the price. There was no compensation last time, and they have said clearly, they are opposed to such an event in an agricultural area.
Lee says these types of events happen annually around the country and will have been something that will have happened before in this type of area, and will investigate how this is done in other places and what precedents there are, and what have they done to overcome these challenges.
The floor put forward objections regarding the fact that this is a tourist route, and how this would be managed over lack of access for two days.
Lee noted the current proposed planning of the route would not be as severe as the previous closures.
DG asked for votes for and against, but after a lack of show of hands either way, a third option was agreed on – strongly advising D&G Council of the almost universally negative responses received from polled businesses and the clearly negative mood of the attendees in the meeting.
DG informed Lee, Ian and the councillors present that the community, businesses and organisations here needs to be engaged with early and robustly on their significant concerns.
If this does not happen and result in a positive outcome, then the CCA will not support a route through the area which will create problems for those living and working here.
DG will write a letter (see link below) to D&G Council stating the case of the majority of objections to the route and reiterate the need for strong and early engagement from the Council on the problems raised.
FINAL AOB POINTS:
The banking washed away by flooding in Bankend in a previous year is still not repaired, councillors present were told that this needs fixed.
The B725 towards Dumfries has soft verges and encroaching edges with mud and earth, and needs swept or cut back as the road width is getting smaller because of it, and some were worried about a possible accident from traffic passing too closely.
Rona Carson asked about a bus stop sign at Kelton Bank. There is actually an official stop here, but it needs to be marked with a sign as some bus drivers do not recognise it as such.
The play-park at Bankend is affected by flooding – the bark is degraded. A lot more chippings are needed to fix this, D&G Council has been asked by Kelly several times. DG notes that the CCA could cover the costs if required, but the councillors have been asked to assist.
MEETING CLOSED
Next meeting Wed 22nd Feb 2023.
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