3rd July 2025
At meeting: Michael Fox (MF Chair); Kate Rew (KR Secretary); Charlie Wild (CW Project Coordinator); Kirsteen Catherwood (KC Volunteer Coordinator); Steve Brocklehurst (SB website volunteer); Nigel Bell (NB Ark At Egwood); Lindsey Stidson (LS); Christine King (CK director); Mark Helyer (MH Take Art)
Apologies: Jess Wright (fundraiser/dev manager) Val Edmunds (director), Karen Rawlinson (treasurer), Julie Chant (South Somerset Clerks assn or similar(!)),Ian leBreton (Crewkerne Rotary); Erin O’Donovan (social media)
Minutes of last meeting – Approved.
Matters Arising
Summer activities
12th July – Sip & Paint, a collaboration with Victoria from Awe and Wonder to raise funds for Summer weaving workshop, 28th July 2024. Open Doors will be organising food for the event. MF to get KC on Sumup payment system. KC will need help from volunteers for both events at GRC and Henhayes. CW to ask Erin to post on Facebook.
Building
Unsuccessful with tenancy for building MF was pursuing; there are other options for another building. NB to look at the business plan. We visited another premises on West street, LS is interested in the premises herself! Wants to run craft courses..?!
MF been approached by local property owner to re-open discussion re NatWest. High net value individuals to donate (?!) large sums to buy it..
Councils have powers to force landlords to get empty buildings on the high street into active use. Could then get the building protected as an asset of community value. Mike Best has pursued this but had no success with the owner of the NatWest.
ACTION: MF to write draft letter for supporters to send to Adam Dance and Mike Best to lobby him to pressure uncooperative property owners.
Insurance: Markel has now agreed to insure Repair Cafe, although at higher price but lower than other quote.
Chop and Chat in Chard: we met Serena Wootton, CW to prompt for actions this month.
Sport in Mind approached us to set up a table tennis session. Needed two table plus qualified coach. MF found table and Marc Walmsley set up as coach. Probably start in September. ACTION: MF to approach Town Council for funding for the table and possibly for sessions.
Chair’s report on the year’s activities
Thank you for coming to the meeting. A year ago we were crowdfunding to get a valuation done of the NatWest, in an effort to persuade the owner to sell to us. In the event the valuation was far below what he thought the building was worth and we have been unable to move forward with him. We are looking into finding other buildings and still hoping the stars align to get the NatWest – an iconic building dominating our high street – back into meaningful public use.
In the last year we have:
- Continued distributing surplus food to people who’d like to use it at the George Reynolds Centre – we have saved 15.6 tonnes from going to landfill in the last 12 months – Kirsteen has more details on our fridge operation later.
- We continued supporting the Chop & Chat community cooking group, which meets every Friday at the Speedwell Hall – in November it celebrates its fourth birthday.
- Launched a weekly Chat Café with the support of the Open Mental Health Network, and now Lindsey has recently agreed to co-ordinate its activities and become a director.
We successfully applied for grant funding that enabled us to:
- Run a Christmas fun food activity in a joint project with Awe & Wonder which does fortnightly art projects for under 5’s and their carers.
- Run a weekly Winter Warmer session for three months, where a cook prepared a soup or stew using surplus food where possible, along with a cheese toastie.
Recruit a part-time fundraiser – very lucky to have Jess Wright working with us, who founded the Zion community centre in Bristol so is familiar with the journey we’re on. Recruit a project co-ordinator – Charlie Wild is a former recycling officer for the City of London, and has brought renewed vigour to our activities – updating our website and marketing activities with the help of Erin, our marketing volunteer. And start to pay Kirsteen, our pantry co-ordinator, for some of the hours she devotes to running the food distribution. She’s been doing this for nearly all of the five years we’ve been running – THANKYOU!!! Kirsteen has also been working hard to set up a Repair Cafe, and we’re delighted to say it’s being launched on September 27th during Recycling Week.
- We’ve changed our trading name to Open Doors Somerset, although Crewkerne Community Kitchen is our registered Community Interest Company name.
- We’ve also become part of a group of four local organisations – with Ark at Egwood, Chard Watch Project and the Chard Community Hub. We all plan to work more closely together and to share our experience and best practises so more people can benefit from our work, and together have made a major application to the National Lottery to support our work. We will also work on sharing expertise and activities between the groups.
- We are still looking for a building we can turn into a community centre. We’ve produced a business plan which we shared with a prospective landlord who gave us positive feedback although they did choose a different tenant. All the activity is helping professionalise our activities and to put us in a good position to set up a community hub when the opportunity arises. Our links to sister organisations in the area will make it easier to share resources, ideas, and to bring new activities into the town.
- September will also see us launching a Table Tennis wellbeing session supported by the mental health charity Sport In Mind, which is funding all, or at least the vast majority of the costs.
- Karen Rawlinson has agreed to start volunteering as our new treasurer from October which is great news. Many thanks to Richard Hawkins for his help and support as treasurer for the past four years, and for his invaluable support for us more generally – he and his wife Jan were among the first people to help us by picking up food from supermarkets.
- We continue to make the organisation more resilient so we are in a good position to take on a space in the town and turn it into a vibrant inclusive community centre, which is now our main mission. Election of Chair and Directors CW took over as chair for the voting. Need to start having board meetings, NB at Ark advice, board meetings regular but infrequent. MF proposed as Chair – KC proposed, CK seconded
Lindsey Stidson has taken on responsibility for the Chat Café, and would like to continue it over the summer. Voted in as a director. Rest of the directors also voted to continue on the board. Co-ordinator’s update CW visited shops find out who has heard about Open Doors Somerset. Great feedback from Stoodley’s – glad to know there were support groups out there. Banner will be mounted outside GRC tomorrow. Erin and CW have started knocking on doors, leafleting residents in particular areas of the town. Visited Mallabones in Misterton, thinking about a clothes swap, as textiles diverted from landfill, school uniform. LS fund from Be A Good Neighbour to help parents with clothing and shoes for children. - ACTION: Chop and Chat having summer break. Looking towards putting a schedule of meals together to attract new people. Going to other community cooking groups. Sherborne, Yeovil, Repair Hub, CK working on putting literature together.
Marketing report from Erin O’Donovan: numbers of views have declined but overall more engagement with posts.
KC – Fridge going well, good steady team of volunteers, working with Apex and Wadham to see if could support the SEN provision – they take bread, fruit, cakes, frozen spaghetti. Positive feedback from people coming, increase in numbers.
Anything else?
SB shared how he benefits from Open Doors. Big thank you to SB for help and support with website.
Homefayre up for auction guide price £320K? Fifth year birthday party 23rd July , Bar 5
Next meeting 7th August 2025 5.30 at Bar 5
