OVER £19,500 OF GRANTS HANDED OUT TO LOCAL PROJECTS

OVER £19,500 was awarded to local groups and projects by the Melksham Area Board at their meeting this month.

A new community hub for Shaw, a new kitchen for the Riverside Club, and two new cycling maintenance stations for the town centre were some of the schemes awarded a grant – which came to a total of £19,552.

Christ Church Shaw was awarded £5,000 towards a £60,000 project to ‘reorder and redecorate’ the church into a community hub.

Their application said, “Christ Church Shaw is the largest community venue in the local area and the nearest venue to the George Ward Estate which has no community facilities. But the Victorian layout of the church makes it inflexible and inaccessible for the community to use it for non-religious purposes.

“We are hoping to redecorate the church, remove the pews and replace with quality wooden chairs, replace and upgrade the audio-visual system including a new hearing loop.

“Whilst these changes will benefit the congrega- tion and our worship, we hope that the changes will also enable the community to use the church for con- certs, exhibitions, meetings etc. The church hopes to set up a new dementia cafe which would only be practical if the pews were removed.”

The Riverside Club were given £2,895 towards improve- ments to their existing kitchen.

Their application said, “Riverside Club has a number of community-run activities, including a regular lunch time club. The facilities currently offer a limited space for storage of food – freezers and fridges. The project is to provide an extended storage area to allow more use of the cupboard space within the kitchen. This will allow other groups to use the kitchen for meals.”

Melksham Hub Café at the train station was awarded £1,500 towards the cost of fitting weatherproof blinds to their outdoor seating area to provide a more usable space during the winter months and bad weather.

“We have recently provided an outside canopy space with a solid wooden pergola construction complete with lighting and Halogen heating,” said the café’s application. “This canopy space is popular and has been a well-used space during the good weather months.

“The cafe interior has limited table space for seating and the use of the canopy area has been popular for small community groups – it is wheelchair friendly, and the cafe has an accessible toilet. We would like to extend the use of the exterior space for as much of the year as we can by fitting roller blinds with visibility panels.”

Melksham Town Council got the thumbs up for their request of £2,075 towards the cost of installing two cycling maintenance station in the town, one adjacent to the Town Hall and one in King George V Playing Fields near the pavilion.

Their application said, “5 cycle stands using the same style as in the Market Place to be installed at the Pavilion by the maintenance station. The procurement and installation of the units will be managed by the town council.”

Melksham Cricket Club was given £5,000 towards the cost of new ‘cricket playing astro’.

“Melksham Cricket Club’s astro playing surface based at Melksham House is over 25 years old and has come to the end of its life- cycle,” said the club in its application. “It is unsafe to bowl on due to the uneven surface. We wish to install a new astro surface that will benefit the whole of Melksham and make the sport playable in all weathers, as the surface dries within a shorter space of time with new modern materials.”

Alzheimer’s Support was awarded £782 for the ongoing costs to run its fortnightly Movement for the Mind sessions in Bowerhill Village Hall, for local people with dementia.

And Independent Living Centre Semington also had their request approved for £2,300 towards the cost of replacing an oil tank and the removal of a bees’ nest in their chimney.