Warborough & Shillingford Cricket Club Consultation

Dear villagers,

I’m writing as Chairman of Warborough & Shillingford Cricket Club (not as a Parish Councillor) about the cricket club’s redevelopment plans for the pavilion.

As many of you will know, the Parish Council voted to approve the plans for redevelopment of the pavilion, which have been put forward for grant funding. In short, the club is aiming to raise funding to entirely renovate the increasingly dilapidated pavilion, thoroughly modernising it to create a more welcoming atmosphere, and create a small 3rd changing room to better accommodate children playing senior cricket and female cricket, both of which we are lucky to have a lot of at Warborough.

The aim is for this project, which is costed around £140,000, to be funded almost entirely through grant funding and contributions from the cricket club and their supporters, with a relatively nominal amount from the Parish Council (who are the owners of the pavilion), which has already been allocated in previous and upcoming budgets. It will also provide a much-needed improvement in a village asset at a fraction of the price of the required repairs and modernisation needs and provide a turnkey village entertainment space. None of that is particularly controversial, but a downside of the plans is the requirement to create a storage barn/shed adjacent to the green fence to the south west of the pavilion, back from the building line to accommodate all the equipment ejected to accommodate the changing room alterations. There was considerable discussion about this requirement and potential alternatives at the December Parish Council meeting.

The cricket club resolved at that meeting that they would go out to the community whilst the grant applications were underway (and thus there is no progress to be made with plans etc) to ensure they have selected the best solution to the problem and if not to consider potential changes. This is why I am writing to you.

The various reference documents (the plans and proposals, both full and abridged) can be found on the PC website (www.ws-pc.org.uk) for easy access, and copies are in a folder in the St. Laurence Hall foyer for those without internet access. There is too much information, unfortunately, for these documents to go on the noticeboards. I should reiterate these are all the documents previously promulgated on this forum before the December meeting, plus the visual renders presented at the meeting itself. I would suggest for those who haven’t read these that they are a good place to start to understand the detail behind the proposals and options considered already.

The club welcomes any and all suggestions, preferably with some good detail to them, which they will collate and assess before reporting back to the Parish Council with any proposed amendments. The club is thus opening a 6-week window for submissions, from Tue 7 Jan until Tue 18 Feb. This should give sufficient time thereafter for collation, discussion and potential changes before presentation at the March PC meeting, by which time we should also likely know the results of the funding applications.

Please send all submissions to me at jonnie.bradshaw@wandscc.org

We look forward to hearing from you.

All the best,

Jonnie Bradshaw
Chairman, W&SCC

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