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COMMUNITY BUILDINGS FEASIBILITY STUDIES

Background

Teesdale Village Halls Consortium was commissioned by Durham Rural Community Council to carry out two feasibility studies between 1st January and 30th June 2010.  The work was funded by the East Durham and North Pennine Dales LEADER programmes.  The studies examined community buildings in the LEADER areas of east Durham and Weardale and assessed the needs of the groups who run them.  It focused on how these needs could be supported, and addressed the potential for future sustainable development of local services delivered by community buildings.

Aims of the feasibility studies

1.  To identify and complete an interview checklist with approximately fifty managing trustees of community buildings in east Durham and Weardale, County Durham.

2.  To gauge the overall level of interest in participating in an informal community buildings network and/or Charter Membership scheme.

3.  To identify a programme for the delivery of support services.

4.  To make a recommendation for the establishment of community building networks as appropriate.

Why were the studies needed?

The stimulus for the studies was the Teesdale Village Halls Consortium model of collaborative working.  This was perceived to provide both a diverse range of services to member halls, and also to open the way for benefits to accrue from organisations co-operating together within a network.  Taken together these benefits and services worked to support individual member halls, offering a greater opportunity for longer term sustainable development.

Evidence from one hundred and forty five community buildings ‘health checks’ conducted under the Defra ‘Change Up’ programme in 2005 indicated that many organisations in County Durham struggled to comply with their charitable duties, their legal responsibilities in effectively managing community facilities, and in their pivotal social role at the centre of community life.

Based on a process of interviews and the application of a survey questionnaire, the study sought to identify the current issues and support needs of community buildings and to discover if community building networks might be perceived as being of benefit to local management committees.

A total of 45 organisations across the county were identified by Durham Rural Community Council and these were invited to participate in the study.  Interviews were carried out face to face with members of management committees in their own community buildings and an inspection tour of the building was conducted after each interview.  An interview checklist was completed, and any other issues or comments that were discussed were recorded.

The interview checklist comprised eleven sections as follows: 

1. Constitutional Matters
2. Managing Meetings
3. Trustee Responsibilities for Employing Staff 
4. Financial Planning
5. Insurance
6. Licences and Other Legal Permissions
7. The Building
8. Hire of Premises
9. Service Provision
10. Marketing and Reaching Out
11. Network Development
    

Recommendations

The recommendations to form a programme of support for community buildings were as follows:

1.  Discussions to take place between Durham Rural Community Council, Teesdale Village Halls Consortium and community halls, to focus upon the potential for establishing local community building networks, how these can be facilitated and funded, what services the networks can provide and the membership options and criteria.

DRCC has since secured funding to develop the North Pennine Dales Community Buildings project.  Please click here for more details.

2.  Utilise the DRCC Hallmark scheme to underpin any networking arrangements, to act as a template for the delivery of advice and support to community buildings and as a benchmark to address the requirements of charitable status, compliance with legal requirements and the role of the hall in the local and wider communities.

3.  Examine the feasibility of establishing a website for community buildings.

4.  Develop a ‘checklist’ of policies and documents needed to ensure they are operating correctly in managing their buildings.

Please click here to read more East Durham LEADER case studies, or here to read more DRCC case studies.  For more information about North Pennine Dales LEADER, please click on the link below.

East Durham LEADER and North Pennine Dales LEADER are each funded by Defra & The European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development: Europe investing in rural areas (EAFRD), with support from County Durham Partnership.