Village Halls Week is a national celebration of village halls, their volunteers and the services they offer their communities. This year Village Halls Week 2019 gained substantial attention for village halls including being featured across 16 BBC stations.

Next year, Village Halls Week 2020 will run from Monday 20 January – Sunday 26 January 2020. If you would like to put the spotlight on your hall see our tips below on how to get involved. 

Share Your History

Thursday 23 January 2020

Share your hall’s history on social media using the hashtag #tbt and

#villagehallsweek. You could put up old pictures or past flyers, detail significant guests, share an old film or write an article on your history.

National Open Day

Saturday 25 January 2020

Next year there will be halls holding open days across all of England. This is a great opportunity to get new trustees, new user groups, boost community

engagement and get a visit from your local MP. 

Connecting Communities in Berkshire (your local ACRE Network member) will soon be able to provide you with a marketing pack. Make sure you register your interest using this link

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/VP5N8YK

Edgbarrow Woods Car Park, Wildmoor Heath, Sandhurst Road, Crowthorne   near RG45 7PP, 7th and 8th December 2019, 11.00 to 15.00

The local Wildlife Trust (BBOWT) is having its annual Christmas tree sale on Saturday 7 and Sunday 8 December.

The Scots pine trees are sourced from local heathland by the Wildlife Trust.    The ‘green’ Christmas trees are sustainably grown, freshly cut the weekend of the sale and drop-resistant.   Felling the trees helps with the heathland management and restoration. 

Mistletoe, holly, pine cones, willow stars, Wildlife Trust cards and calendars will also be on sale – and all are recyclable

Come on down to Edgbarrow Woods Car Park, Wildmoor Heath the weekend of Saturday 7 and Sunday 8 December to buy your Christmas tree and other goodies.

Support your local wildlife sites.  All proceeds go to the Wildlife Trust – Berks, Bucks & Oxon (BBOWT).

For further details visit http://www.bbowt.org.uk/whats-on

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Photograph  –    Scots Pine and pine cone on Wildmoor Heath nature reserve  (credit Pete Crome)

Our sister organisation in Yorkshire, Community First Yorkshire, have worked alongside members of the Action with Communities in Rural England (ACRE) network to build a guide to Community Led Housing (CLH) from a planner’s perspective.

The guide is for planners, local authority housing enabling officers and anyone supporting community led housing groups in England. The guide is available for download upon giving your name and organisation: A Planners Guide to Community Led Housing.

To read the full story on the guide and a link to the guide itself please click here.

If you have an interest in Community Led Planning please don’t forget to book a place on our workshop on Thursday 19th September 2019 at 7pm at Calcot Community Centre (just off Juction 12 on the M4).

We are aware that development and new houses are currently being built throughout Berkshire on a large scale but are they really affordable or accessible to people growing up or working in your village or community?

Community-led housing is housing built on a not-for-profit basis by a community to meet its own needs. There are a number of different approaches to community-led housing, all resulting in homes built for the community but with different processes and levels of involvement.

This short course will enable participants to understand the differences between the various models of community-led housing. It is aimed at Parish & Town Councillors, land owners and anyone from both rural and urban communities interested in exploring the options for providing affordable housing for people with a connection to their community. The options of rural exception sites is now quite well-known but at this session we will examine the details of this as well as delving into other options including community land trusts and housing co-operatives.

Places must be booked, to book your place please complete this form: https://ccberks.wufoo.com/forms/community-led-housing/

On the 21st June 2019, 13 people from 9 different communities across Berkshire spent the day in Woolhampton developing new skills to support their work in Neighbourhood Planning. Dot and Helen from Community Organisers Ltd led the day, taking us though a fascinating process that started with listening skills, then examined where power lies within communities, before exploring how to take positive action in planning for the future.

One learner commented how nice it was to meet a diverse group of people passionate about the communities they live in. Another said “The trainers were excellent: knowledgeable, passionate and positive. Community Organising can clearly make a big difference.”

This brand new workshop was based on the Introduction to Community Organising one-day course, but tailored for Neighbourhood Planning groups. Community Organising is particularly relevant to Neighbourhood Planning and so CCB worked with Community Organisers Ltd to tailor their introductory course to be of particular relevance to groups working on developing a Neighbourhood Plan.

The introductory course has been delivered in Berkshire 3 times since July 2018, giving a further 47 people new skills to support their work in their communities. Further, more in-depth training is planned for autumn 2019 and spring 2020, which will offer people the opportunity to experience the main features of Community Organising in much greater depth. Further information on these and other training opportunities will be published here in CCB’s Action for All newsletter. To register your interest in these courses you can also e-mail Gemma.Pearce@ccberks.org.uk

CCB is very keen to provide networking and development opportunities for anyone in Berkshire involved with Neighbourhood Planning, developing community assets and affordable housing. Please contact Tim.Parry@ccberks.org.uk if you are interested in joining in.