Village Hall AGM
The 2022 Village Hall AGM will be held on Tuesday 15th November at 7pm. All are welcome to attend. The report is here.
The Chair’s Review of the Year
Welcome to the Village Hall Annual General Meeting 2022.
Once again a big thank you to everyone on the Management Committee for everything you’ve done this year. And once again an equally enormous thank you to everyone who contributes so positively to the Village Hall.
Members of the Village Hall Management Committee are also Trustees of the Charity, with responsibility for managing the Village Hall.
Diana Probyn, Queen of the Café, has decided to stand down from the committee. Diana was instrumental in establishing what has become a solid, successful institution in East Meon life. Diana is not deserting the Café!
Our Hall Manager Emily Rich has done a fabulous job, successfully attracting all sorts of new hires over the year – Stand Up Comedy, Pilates and many others mean that the halls have become mostly busy instead of mostly silent. Our community benefits from the activities and the hall needs the revenue.
Matt Millward, our technology guru has done all sorts and is currently helping us equip the hall to support the Village Emergency Plan as the weather gets colder this winter. We now have a long overdue fire alarm and are in the process of expanding the CCTV while also working on energy efficiencies.
The dominance of Covid has diminished over the year, but you’ll still find hand cleanser on each table in the café and a careful cleaning regime as Gemma Griffiths works her magic. A big thank you to Matt Bailey too by the way for transforming the front and back halls, they look so much better with new plaster, new paint, new coat hooks.
The online booking system with keypad security and no keys means bookings are more flexible and easier for hirers. A hirer recently found the hall on line, booked space and started a class in less than 30 minutes. George Thompson continues to enhance his system with further refinements are on their way.
Andrew Hughes had the excellent idea of gathering a number of local village halls together to share ideas, to see how we can help each other do better. George’s online booking system received a lot of interest, which is great for us too.
As for events, the hall has run and supported several activities over the year. Lighting and gazebos for carols sung outside the Court House, projector and sounds at the first of the month lay church services, the May Day Family Fun event complete with the Great Meon River Boat Race with the school barbeque and The Platinum Jubilee Beacon Lighting celebration. The Harvest Supper was a great success too.
The Village Hall continues to do more for younger East Meoners, much to the delight of some senior East Meoners who have seen the nursery in action. The Village Nursery has become thoroughly embedded giving families better access to pre-school education while increasing the number of East Meon children attending our School. It has to be acknowledged that the drop in the birth rate that occurred at the start of Covid has begun to come through with an inevitable impact on the nursery and school.
While The Rev Phili Good moved on to new pastures in June, the first floor here in the hall continues to be the co-ordination centre for the Upper Meon Benefice supporting Warnford, West Meon, Langrish as well as All Saints here in East Meon. This is also where the Food Bank operates from to benefit the village.
The financial year has not been easy, the amount spent on energy has become considerable. Just like it is for everyone, costs are rising. Thankfully Emily’s work in winning a greater number of hires will generate additional income. Looking ahead, it will be necessary to increase the hire rates, the current rates have been in place for quite some time. There will be a mechanism to ensure that those who live in East Meon can enjoy discounted rates.
While the impact of Covid has been undeniable, continuous care and attention has found ways to attract new activities and improve the hall. The committee continues to seek greater utilisation, greater community inclusion for greater contribution to the village and with more robust revenue on which future plans can be developed.
This Christmas the school and nursery are again collaborating by combining their Christmas fairs this year and with the community café – cakes, mince pies, hot drinks, what’s not to like! Community and Collaboration continue to be core themes for the hall, a Village Emergency Plan to help particularly over the winter and plans for the Coronation in May are already under way.
Lastly, the most enormous thanks to everyone who contributes to East Meon Village Hall.
Thank you.
David Pepper
Chair East Meon Village Hall Committee
chair@eastmeonvillagehall.co.uk
The committee
David Pepper (Chair)
Sarah Round
Jonathan Iremonger
Andrew Hughes
Leo Seymour
Matt Millward
The committee welcomes feedback, suggestion and comment. Contact comms@eastmeonvillagehall.co.uk
East Meon Village Hall Welcomes The Village Nursery
In November The Village Nursery will move to the village hall from its current base. This is a professional operation taking children from 2-4 years running five days a week (9-3pm bar Tuesday – 9-12), allowing working parents to leave their children at the village hall. It costs £5.25 per hour. The Nursery has an established client base, many of whom come from the village. This will save the travelling time.
Local mother and school governor Anna Tebbut – who worked at the previous hall based nursery – said “There are currently children in the village who have never been to pre-school because there are families living in East Meon without any transport. Pre-school is an important element of child development and having a pre-school in the village once more would enable more of our community to access child care”.
Village Hall Committee chair David Pepper said “This is a significant new use for the larger hall and while it will reduce availability for other daytime users, having a nursery in the village again will support children who were unable to benefit from pre-school. The committee has consulted widely on this and also carefully considered how this will affect the village. Appropriate protections are in place and we will monitor how this works over the coming months”.
Hall users should note that the Village Nursery operates in school term only, the large hall is available at other times and during term after 3pm, small hall is available at all times. The Café is not affected. All regular users have been consulted, and an alternative venue is also under discussion.
Update, April 2022. The Village Hall Committee has reviewed the operation of the Nursery as agreed last autumn. We are pleased to note the growing number of East Meon children and the excellent relationship with the school. The financial contribution from the use of the hall is a very welcome. We are happy that the use of the hall should continue a planned.
Contact the hall info@eastmeonvillagehall.co.uk or Jo Baker at The Village Nursery CNSplay@outlook.com for further information.
Nestled in the beautiful curves of the South Downs National Park, East Meon is a quintessential English village.
At the heart of our community is the village hall, providing the ideal venue for celebrating those momentous lifetime occasions; christenings, birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, and wakes!
The hall also hosts regular events; yoga, cinema, table tennis, fitness training, fund raising events, and we even host a mobile dental service!
Our stage also means that we are happy to host entertainment events for both commercial and non-commercial organisations. It is also the perfect venue for companies that would like to promote their services to our diverse local community or as a base for organisations that may be running events locally.
We have a state of the art projector, including screen, which would make the hall an ideal venue for community engagement sessions or company meetings.
The hall has two rooms that may be hired separately or together and can hold up to 250 people. We can also provide tables and chairs, as well as a kitchen complete with cups, cutlery etc, and a dishwasher! And given the fickle weather we enjoy, we have both heating and air conditioning.
We also have ample car parking on site for our hall customers, and of course we are fully licensed. Please explore the web site and do not hesitate to get in contact if you have any questions.
The village hall team look forward to welcoming you to our community. And please remember that by hiring the hall not only will you will be holding your event in a beautiful location, but also be supporting our community as all the funds raised go directly to maintaining and improving East Meon Village Hall.