Chillingham Community Association

 

Newsletter

 

February 2009

 

 

This is the first of our newsletters to give you information about the Association and current activities. There seem to be lots of things going on at the Centre and this seems to be a good way to let you know about them. We’ll probably miss some things so if you have an item about the Association activities for the newsletter please email your piece to Peter Liston at news@chillingham.com.au

 

Solar Energy Grant

Several members of the Association put a lot of work into applying for a solar energy grant for the Centre. We learnt in December that we had been very successful, and had been awarded a grant of $48,409. This grant will cover the costs of three components;

 

  1. 12 solar panels which will be mounted at the southern end of the Centre. These panels will feed electricity back into the grid, so reducing our use of grid electricity. They will also charge a backup battery to power lights should the grid supply fail.
  2.  A solar powered garden light to light up the garden shed and carpark. This has a built in battery so it can operate at night.
  3.  A solar hot water system. Currently our hot water in the Centre is heated by gas. The new system will be placed on the verandah roof and will have an off peak electric booster.

 

These components will assist the Centre to radically reduce its carbon footprint. We will gauge the savings we make by a series of energy audits. We expect installation to begin sometime in February.

 

 

Art Group

The Chillingham Art Group meets at the Community Centre each Tuesday from 11.00am to 3.00pm.  Anyone wishing to come along would be most welcome, it costs only $2 per day and artists working with oil, acrylic and watercolour are available to offer advice to newcomers.

 

The Art Group supported by the Tweed Shire Salt Cultural Arts Fund and the Chillingham Community Association are also running a series of Art Workshops to assist members of the Tweed shire and local community to develop their artistic talents. The next workshop, portrait painting, will be running from 10.00am to 3.00pm on 10 March. For bookings and further information, contact Brian on 02 6679 1190.

 

Sustainability Strategy (Note: As of 14 April, 2009, the CCA has withdrawn from the sustainability project)

Chillingham has been chosen as one of three villages in the Tweed to partake in a Sustainability Project run by the NSW Dept of State and Regional Development.  A project coordinator position will be advertised very soon, so if you are interested and have experience or qualifications in the area of relocalising economy, sustainable agriculture, or social and cultural sustainability why not apply.

 The idea behind the project is to look at our local communities within the Tweed, where our strengths and weaknesses are and how we can plan for the future, in order to become more resilient to guard against possible effects of climate change. The project coordinator will hold community workshops starting in March, so come and share your ideas on how the village of Chillingham can become more sustainable.  Maybe you have an idea which could get funded. The Department of Environment and Climate Change has new funding to help communities change towards local self sufficiency.


Bore

You might have noticed that there is a bit of construction work going on in the CCA grounds near the outside tables. This is a bore that the Council drilled for us to ensure that the outside toilets have a water supply. They found good water only about 15 metres down. The work is not quite finished; we are still awaiting the installation of the pump and connection to the water tank.

 

Pizza oven

Have you seen our new pizza oven?  It’s a beauty – constructed largely by Harlie Axford and John Peach, and with a great frog on top courtesy of our local potter John Gillson. We’ve had a few firings so far and had some lovely pizzas.

 

Garden Group and Youth Group

We also have a garden group responsible for the veggie and herb gardens at the Centre and a youth group. We hope to have details on their activities in our next newsletter.

 

Market

Many of you will be aware that we held out first market at the Centre in early January.  It was very successful. Lots of stallholders were there and many people came; from all over the region. And the weather smiled on us. As well as all the stalls the committee sold food to the hungry crowd. This was really successful, people liked the food and the ambiance and we raised a good deal of money for the Association. We hadn’t done this before so were very pleased with the market itself and our fund raising.

 

This market is going to be a regular occurrence throughout the year – every second Sunday of the month from 8am to 2pm. Next market is the coming Sunday, 8th February, so please drop down and have a look around. Perhaps pick up a bargain or a treasure. Maybe you’d like to have a stall yourself. If so you should contact Barend De Klerk (ph 02 6679 1284) who is coordinating the stalls for the markets. Or perhaps you’d like to assist with the food stall the CCA runs at the market, we could always do with a bit of help. Come up and see us on market day.

 

Committee

The Association is guided by a committee with our current president Sonja Groves. The other office bearers on the committee are the vice president Liz Harmon, treasurer Jan Yates and secretary Peter Liston. The committee meets every first Saturday of the month , 2pm at the Chillingham Community Centre. All members are welcome to attend.  To contact the committee, email Sonya at cca@nsw.chariot.net.au  or leave a message at the Centre (ph 02 6679 1633).

 

 

Membership fees

Are you current for this financial year? Fees are only $5 a year and help to keep the Centre open and pay for things like the Christmas Party. You can check/pay your membership at the Centre.

 

And finally, a haiku:

 

Autumn leaves falling

                        Silken robes

                        and diamonds

                        Clothe a platypus