The Field Newsletter: Edition 8
Welcome to the “The Field “ newsletter no 8. We’ve all been very busy over the last month, as you will see. So apologies that this newsletter is a few days late.
Date for Your Diary
We are planning to hold a Community Engagement meeting on the afternoon of Sunday 27th October 2024. This will be an opportunity for everyone to get up to speed on where we are with the Project, ask questions and or offer suggestions on moving forward with the Project.
Expect an email on this in the near future. Please alert friends, neighbours and anyone else interested to come, too.
Fun(d) Raising Events
September saw three big events locally all of which saw lots of support and all of which raised large sums for The Field’s fund.
First, we had the Kinlochyard Sale in the village hall – excellently put together and managed by Rebecca Rowthorn. Lots of stalls with fascinating things to buy along with tea and cakes (including Joyce’s now legendary meringues). And visitors did buy with the sale raising £954.81
Then there was Janine’s expertly organised bat presentation and evening walk. Fortunately, the weather was good enough for all to have a good stroll through the village, using bat detectors to see where the bats really were. Fantastically, the bat evening raised £648.31
Closely following, was Bee’s cream tea and open garden. After a very wet August it really was good to see the sun on that afternoon and many people enjoyed walking through Bee’s Garden and enjoying tea and cake. We all also admired the paintings from the art group and played hunt the fairies and guess the weight of the turnip. £725.70 was raised for The Field that afternoon.
A big thank you to all who organised these three events and to all who attended and supported them.
Raised so Far
As a result of all of our efforts and all the support we have received, so far this year we have raised £5328.82 – a massive achievement. Many thanks to the community residents and the Funding Working Group who have organised much of this.
Asking for More
Raising Capital Funds for Purchasing the Field
We are however entering the most crucial and challenging part of The Project namely raising sufficient funds to purchase The Field. The market cost of The Field is £245,000 and while we are applying for grant funding we will also need to raise a significant sum directly to ‘bridge the gap’ between what grant funding is likely to produce.
A Stage 2 funding application has been submitted to the Scottish Land Fund to seek capital funds for the purchase of The Field. Unfortunately this organisation has had its budget cut by 50% this financial year. Our SLF Advisor has indicated that the reality of this cut means that only 50% of Projects applying will be successful.
As mitigation against this we are also planning to submit an application to the National Heritage Lottery fund in the next couple of weeks to seek match funding should our application to SLF fall short of what we had hoped for and to seek capital funding for some of the development plans we have for The Field.
The plan is to submit to the Heritage fund before the SLF panel meet in November to consider our application. Applying for match funding is expected to improve our chances of success with both organisations.
In addition, we will be carrying out a crowdfunding exercise to complement the ongoing appeal to our residents and supporting authorities for pledges to bridge any gaps in funding.
This is aimed at providing further confidence to the public funding bodies of the widespread community support for our Project. Pledges we receive before mid-October will play a part in helping to persuade the public bodies to invest in us.
Welcome
We’re really pleased to welcome Hilary Soanes who has started working for KCRA as Business Support Assistant on a temporary contract funded by a grant from Forth Valley and Lomond Community Led Local Development Fund.
Hilary started her working life in banking, following her graduation from Leeds University. But in 2004 she moved to Scotland to open a B&B close to RSPB Gartocharn – a true life escape to the country. In 2022 she moved to Drymen and volunteered with the Drymen Community Development Trust as Treasurer and Director. She loves all things outdoors including cycling, hiking, running, skiing, travel and adventure.
I’m sure we’ll all find Hilary a great person to work with and she’ll become an invaluable part of our activities.
This newsletter has been put together by Nick Lester-Davis, Bernard Love, Joyce Kelly and Andy Manders with additional help from Fiona McNeill.