RADCLIFFE on TRENT, METHODIST CHURCH

RADCLIFFE ON TRENT METHODIST CHURCH

Minutes of a Church Council Meeting held on 28th September 2009 in the Prayer Room

Present:    Christine Anderson            Gareth Ingram
Malcolm Anderson (Treasurer)        Stuart Jones
Chris Boon                Julia Lord
        Neville Bemrose                Dave Morley
        Gwyn Farmer                     Barbara Penistan
        Rae Goddard                Margery Siggs (Secretary)
        Hilary Greenhalgh            Rev Janet Tanner (Chair)
        Joe Greenhalgh                Heather Wilson
Sheila Hood

In attendance:   Lisa Jones
              Wendy Layhe
                          Gordon Penistan


1.    Welcome & Devotions. Welcome and devotions were led by Rev Janet Tanner

2.    Apologies and Membership of meeting. Janet confirmed membership of the meeting. Apologies were received from: David Holmes, Helen Hancock, Jon Hancock, Judy Holborow, Clive Marshall, Sarah Malik and Paul Carver.

3.    Minutes of the Church Council meeting held on 24th June 2009. The minutes were approved and signed.

4.    Matters arising. There were no matters arising

5.    Correspondence and letters of greeting
5.1 Chris Boon requested that a letter of thanks be sent to Douglas Harrison who has compiled the pastoral lists for many years. Chris will now undertake this task.
5.2 A letter had been received from Kath Jones, Secretary to Local Preachers, stating that a recent meeting it was warmly recommended that Chris Boon and Jon Hancock be encouraged to continue as Worship Leaders for another term of 3 years. The meeting unanimously agreed to this and asked that a letter of thanks and encouragement be sent to Chris and Jon.
5.3 Clive Marshall sent a letter of resignation, as congregational representative, due to his impending move to Stamford. It was agreed that a letter of thanks be sent to Clive in recognition of his wonderful contribution to our church life.

6.    Finance
6.1 Accounts for year ending 31st August 2009. Malcolm Anderson presented the accounts for the year ending 31st August 2009. Malcolm explained how the accounts were made up of ten funds, the General Funds being the main one. It could be seen from the General Fund that voluntary income had increased, total giving (gift-aided standing orders, cash collections, envelopes and non gift aided regular giving) was up by 12%, during the last quarter. Room Hire had also increased (due to increased charges and income received from the Youth Project for use of the schoolroom). The Balance carried forward amounted to £4,531.20. Charitable giving amounted to £9,101.33. The accounts were audited by Reg Malkin.

6.2 Schedule B – the standard form of accounts for the charity commission was signed by the minister.
        6.3 Budget for 1st September 2009 to 31st August 2010.
        Collections based on last quarter plus 3%
        Malcolm reported that recovered tax was to be reduced from 28% to 25% in April next year.
        £3,000 to be allocated to Mission as in previous years
        The gas and electric supply to be switched from British Gas to Southern Electric.
        £2,000 to be transferred to Property
        The question of increasing cleaners wages to be brought to next meeting
        The proposed budget was accepted and agreed by the meeting.
        6.4    Reserves Policy form for Circuit, showing appropriate amount of £30,000 was signed by the treasurer and Dave Morley
6.5 Business Reserve Account. This account has run alongside the current account with monies being transferred to it thus attracting a higher interest. However, as interest rates have fallen and the difficulties it causes in monitoring each transaction for book keeping purposes, Malcolm asked, and it was agreed, that the account be closed.

7.    Pastoral
7.1 Chris Boon informed the meeting that at present 21 Pastoral Visitors attended to the needs of 168 members and 87 adherents
7.2 It was proposed and agreed that Heather Wilson be appointed as a pastoral visitor.

8.    Worship and Fellowship
8.1 Collections: It was agreed that the collection from the three services on Christmas Eve be divided between Friary Drop In and the Fish Scheme. The collection, and proceeds from the Christmas card, to be sent to Action for Children.
8.2 Proceeds from the Gift Service on 6th December will go to The Friary Drop In.
8.3. A service for the bereaved will take place at 6.30pm on 13th December
The Junior Church Nativity Play will take place on 20th December at 10.00am.
Christian Aid Carol Singing in the village on the morning of 19th December.

9.    Christians Together in Radcliffe
9.1 Rae Goddard reported the following:
·    CTR Forum meeting on 15th December welcomed the two new Radcliffe Ministers, Rev Janet Tanner and Rev Graeme Anderson.
·    A website for CTR is being planned.
·    Youth Project. The group has been held every Friday evening, with 30 young people attending, and continued throughout the school holidays. Some discipline problems are being addressed.
·    Four events have been held. and more are planned, to help the teenagers from all 4 churches to get together and support one another, particularly so that they won’t feel isolated at school etc. An open meeting is planned for November.
·    One World week commences 19th October and teams will be going into Dayncourt to hold short assemblies.
·    Christmas cards will be produced and delivered to every house in Radcliffe.
·    Carols at The Grange will be held on Monday 21st December at 7.15pm.
·    Services will continue to be held at the six Residential Homes in Radcliffe on a regular basis
·    Service for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity will be held next year at Wellspring.
·    Holiday Club at Easter. Janet Tanner will take over the role, previously held by Helen Fyall, in running the club.

10.    Outreach and Mission
10.1 Saturday morning Christian Coffee Shop. Wendy Layhe reported that no funding had been received to date. It is hoped that the cafe will open on 14th November and run on the second Saturday of each month. Wendy outlined the following points and requirements:
1) Painting of the schoolroom will take place during half term
2) The group requested that 40 new chairs be purchased for the schoolroom and that the grey chairs be recycled.
3) Piano to be removed from school room.
4) New lighting – looking for funding from church.
5) The following items are awaiting funding:
        New Tables (old ones to be used for time being)
        Door to be created between school room and kitchen
Serving area to be created
Craft Trolley – contacted Food for Thought for possible funding
New crockery
         Fridge
6) It is requested that:
Tables to be cleared from entrance area and church to display literature in rack on wall.
Notice boards to contain relevant information such as when, where, contact details of group.
Toilets to be cleared of changing table, old cupboards and flower stands. New cupboards to replace if necessary (awaiting funding).

Following discussion, the meeting agreed to support the initiative of the Cafe and agreed to the purchase 40 new chairs at an approximate cost of £1,000. The grey chairs only to be recycled. The piano to be offered to members of the church. It was agreed that the other items be referred to the Property Committee.

Chris Boon left the meeting at 8.40pm

10.2 Advent Fair. It was agreed that the event would take place on Saturday 5th December.
The organising would be left to the Team Leaders.

10.3 Radcliffe on Trent Community Youth Project. Malcolm Anderson reported that the group had met for 17 weeks averaging 35 young people 11 – 16 years. The highest attendance was 46 with 100 different individuals having attended overall.   There has been some challenging behaviour which is being dealt with. At present there are 22 volunteers (not all church people) but more are needed to work on a rota basis as 8-10 are needed per evening. It is hoped that Nottingham Council Youth Dept will help with an arts team to provide mosaics, art, drama and break dancing.
The question of employing a Christian Youth Worker has been put on hold as none of the other denominations have offered funding. Other ways of funding are being investigated.

11.    Property
11.1 Brownies. Following items going missing, Julia Lord requested permission to provide and install a lockable cupboard/cabinet within the storage cupboards in the schoolroom. The meeting agreed to this request.
11.2 Schedule A was completed and signed by the Minister.
11.3 Quinquenial Inspection. Dave Morley reported that the inspection had highlighted many areas of concern both structurally and in appearance. Items have been listed and shown as requiring attention within a) 12 months (essential), b) 5 years (essential) or c) 5 years (advisable). Most items fell within the first two categories and included problems with guttering and water damage, a leaning boundary wall, repairs to roof, brickwork and repointing and rotten widow sills in church.

11.4 Refurbishment of Property.

Report from Refurbishment Committee presented by Dave Morley.

·    The present building was completed in 1893 with the capacity of 150 in the church
·    At a later date:1918 the hall was added
·    Surveyed in 1960
·    In 1993 structural repairs were made to the church roof main timbers as a short term measure with the recommendation of “a long term solution of a new roof”!
·    Schoolroom roof lowered in 1994 due to the weakness in the wall and roof structure refurbishment carried out at the same time.

Quinquennial has highlighted several areas of concern structurally and in appearance.

The major issues are the windows in the church, the brickwork and pointing of the church and the decoration of the whole site. The immediate issues are being dealt with but the site is becoming tired.

The worship area is not always big enough for special occasions or some Sunday services and the entrance to the rooms at the rear of the church is not as inviting as we would like The last time we visited this I felt that there had been no additional initiatives for outreach and service that we were looking at improvements largely for our own interests. I feel now that the situation has changed somewhat and this is an appropriate time to reconsider how we can do what we do better by improving our facilities.

Now I know that some of you are thinking – well we were here two years ago, we spent £3000 for nothing what has changed this time. Well I think that there is more support now than then -evidence - the number of people who have joined the working group and the property committee to formulate a proposal. Having had my fingers burned once I shall be far more cautious in my dealings with architects and will work with carefully written briefs and conditions. We have members of the group who are professionals in the industry and who are advising us. It will cost to employ an architect but we will be making every endeavour to minimize and control this. If you approve we are intending to enter into discussions with more than one architect and to require them to make proposals for 3 levels of refurbishment at different project costs as I will outline later. As before it will be a church council decision to proceed or not at each stage.
So I would like to outline our thoughts on what we may be using as a brief to any prospective architect.

Draft Requirements for Church Redevelopment Programme (Results of meeting 15th Sept)
Brief for option 1 (in no particular order)
·    Worship area to be at least as large as at present, preferably significantly increased, and to be a higher quality environment visually, acoustically and specially.
·    At least three medium sized meeting/quiet rooms
·    A dedicated room for the older youth group
·    An equivalent space to the present schoolroom which is dividable
·    Larger, better equipped and better located kitchen
·    Cafeteria area
·    Traidcraft shop
·    Better and more accessible toilets , Male, Female and Disabled
·    Office/Photocopy/vestry room
·    Increased and appropriately located storage for:
§    Chairs, tables
§    Youth group equipment
§    Toddlers equipment
§    After school club equipment
§    Junior Church materials
·    Consistent floor levels for disabled access
·    Modern, environmentally friendly, heating and ventilation system
·    Upgraded Services (Drains etc)
·    Audio visual systems which are accessible throughout the building including hearing loops.
·    Provide car parking

Vision:
·    A welcoming, inviting, appearance and approach
·    A building which creates interest
·    An open aspect
·    To have architectural merit
·    To enhance the street scene
·    To embrace change and innovation
·    To have a positive impact on the village community

Options:
1.    Comprehensive redevelopment of the whole site
2.    Redevelopment of the rear of the site with refurbishment and enhancement of the worship area
3.    Minimum option :
§    Replace and modernise the heating and ventilation
§    Rebuild and improve the kitchen facility
§    Rebuild/reorganize the Junior church meeting rooms
§    Relocate and improve the toilets
§    Provide additional area for cafeteria

Our thoughts ran to the possibility of a two floor building with more open aspect on the ground floor with central utilities toilets kitchen and café style foyer. With a lift to the upper floor. But we would not wish to direct the architect in the first place, but rely on his imagination with the proviso that we of course would have input during the design stages to ensure it fulfilled our requirements.

Itinerary
·    Establish a budget
·    Tender for architects using above vision and brief
·    Presentation of their interpretation and approximate castings
·    Choice of architects
·    Shortlist/interview
·    Instruct one architect
·    Presentation by architect of draft proposals for each option
·    Stakeholder consultation/ Public consultation
·    Recommendations to Church Council
·    Agree which proposal to go forward

Estimated time to carry out these stages 27 weeks!

The following comments were noted following Dave’s presentation.
·    The need to ensure that the needs of people with disabilities are recognised
·    Now is the time to start the process, with caution
·    Gordon Penistan thanked Dave for his very clear presentation
·    Jo Greenhalgh expressed some misgivings stressing the need to have the congregation with us as we cannot afford to lose what we have
·    Would it be possible to relocate the church on another village site?
·    Where would the church meet whilst work was being carried out?

Proposal: The approval of the Church Council to start the process by contacting other successful church schemes to learn from their experiences and approaching architects to tender using the three levels of development outlined above. The proposal was accepted unanimously.

There were further comments:
·    The need to share ideas with the congregation
·    Dave Morley agreed to speak to the congregation at the morning service on 4th October to keep them in the picture concerning these plans. Malcolm Anderson stated that he could build the subject into his service on Sunday 11th October (Anniversary weekend)
·    Malcolm informed the meeting that local fund raising would be necessary, the equivalent of £1,000 per member, before applying for grants
·    Malcolm also stated that in all on- line dealings with The Connexion, Methodist Property Office, a designated person is required and requested permission of the meeting to approach the Superintendent Minister, offering to take on this role. The meeting agreed to this request.
Julia Lord left the meeting at 10.00pm

The following items to be referred to next meeting
12.    Circuit Matters:
13.    Any other business

14.    Dates of future meetings:       Tuesday 17th November 2009.         AGCM: Sunday 25th April 2010 as part
Tuesday 16th February 2010.            of morning worship.
Thursday 24th June 2010.


The meeting ended at 10.10pm with the sharing of the Grace.