Oakley Green, Fifield & District Community Association
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The Community Action Plan, published at the end of 2009, proposed that an organisation was formed to formally run and represent the interests of the local residents and businesses and to implement the actions in the Action Plan.

At an All Volunteers Meeting at the end of January 2010, it was decided to "legitimise" our efforts by establishing an Association with a constitution, structure and officers. After much discussion, we came to the conclusion that the best way forward was to create a Company Limited by Guarantee.

It was officially formed and incorporated under the Companies Act 2006 as a private company limited by guarantee, on Wednesday March 3, 2010. It is called The Oakley Green, Fifield and District Community Association Limited - Company No. 7175596.

The Rules of the Association can be viewed here and a hard copy of the Articles of Association can be obtained on request by sending an enquiry here.

After setting up the Association, four Directors were appointed for an initial period of just over 6 months, until the first AGM was held in September 2010. These Directors were Louise Shenston, Robin Howard, Helen Howard and Grenville Annetts. Now every year at the AGM, one of the 4 Directors stands down on a rotation basis and Elections for vacancies occur.

For the year 2013/14 - there are three Directors in place - Helen Howard, Louise Shenston and Grenville Annetts - and we have one vacancy.

The most important forums for progressing activities and implementing the Community Action Plan were the initial 7 Work Groups, the AGM in September, and two or three General Meetings a year - previously called All Volunteer Meetings. The Work Groups met as and when required and were each lead by a Spokesperson. A Committee made up of all the Directors and Spokespersons met about 6 times a year to coordinate and monitor activities.

The Work Group structure has been very successful over the years but today their number has focussed to 4 main areas - Communications, Environment, Roads & Transport, and Planning. There have been notable achievements in the struggle to convince BT-Openreach to provide some sort of Broadband worthy of the name to our area and we thank Theresa May for coming to our aid. There have been achievements in improving some of the drainage "wet spots" that are significant challenges in our area but there is still much to be done. A continual effort to make sense of speed limits, HGV road usage, road improvements, etc, is an ongoing task for Roads & Transport. Much work has been done in the past in the area of Planning but The Residents' Association - OGFRA - has made this their main focus over the years and we now rely on their expertise and information and thank them for it.

The Association has annual running costs for running the website, Public Liability insurances, Data Protection Registration, the quarterly free Newsletter, communication fliers, hiring of the Memorial Hall for meetings etc. On the income side, we have Membership Subscriptions, donations, grants, Newsletter advertising and social events to keep the Association solvent. The Annual Accounts are available here.

Membership of The Association is open to all individuals in our area and subscriptions are £3 per year per household - £5 for two years - or £10 for 5 years. Please Note : Households can have more than one Member, but only one pays !. We have Public Liability and Employer Liability insurances in place through an annual policy, but this Company set up limits any potential liability of Members to just £1 in the event of any claims against the Company. Most clubs and societies these days are now taking this route.

We promote membership of The Association at social events, via the website and in our quarterly newsletters. You may remember that we achieved a remarkable response rate of 74% for our Residents Survey - and it would be great if we were able to reach a similar level of membership for the Association - to demonstrate that we still have the support of the majority of our Residents. You can join here or Membership Forms can be downloaded here.

So please support your community and become a Member of The Association - a snip at just £3 for a year, £5 for 2 years, or £10 for 5 years per household !

Thank you for visiting the Website !