Minutes of the Meeting of the Paignton Home Garden & Allotment Society held at the RAOB Club, Paignton on Tuesday 14 May 2019

Present: Alan Smith, Flis Cotton, Stefan Phillpott, Andrew Bibbings, Jackie Green, Gary Buckingham, Liz Barnes, Kay Mason, Phil Moore, Jodi White.

The Chairman welcomed everyone to the meeting.

1.    Apologies: Joe Wallis, Christine Guiver, Jackie Yates.

2.    Minutes of the previous meeting were read and approved.

3.    Matters arising from the minutes:

• Offer of new treasurer – Jodi from LP was present at the meeting. She agreed to allow me to contact the current treasurer with a view to handing over.
• With regard to seed sales, the vice chairman suggested that it may be a good idea for site reps at each site to store a box of assorted seeds so they are available to their own plotholders. This would increase availability and hopefully increased sales would follow.
  It was pointed out that as the seeds were sold in quantities of 50 or 100, there was probably enough for 2 seasons, hence sales had been a bit slow this year as people had stock from last year. Chairman agreed to look at this and possibly sell smaller quantities next year.
• Sec confirmed that the official deadline for payment of plot subs had passed and so if plotholders had not paid for the 2019/20 year, their leases could be forfeited. Sec agreed to ask the treasurer for an up to date list of unpaid plots and contact any non-payers.

 4.    Correspondence:

• A plotholder has asked for details of what is being sold in the shop, other than seeds – Sec said she would report back. This was discussed and the Chairman confirmed that we sell ground cover at £1 per m length and ‘debris netting’ which is sufficient to keep bugs etc. off crops.
• Another lengthy email had been received from the plotholder on 16a DR and this was read and discussed. Sec agreed to draft a letter/email to both parties setting out a possible solution, or at least a way forward as we are all keen to see and end to the matter.
• Request from plotholder on LP for help with her plot and the vice chairman agreed to email her to discuss.

5.    Chairman’s Report:

• Chairman reported that he had sold a few onions at the Oakleigh shop which was encouraging and there were still plenty of stock available.
• Rubbish is being dumped by the main gate at Oakleigh by plotholders – please could this stop. We are all responsible for clearing our own plots. Please speak to the Chairman if you have any problems with this, but do not leave rubbish by the gate in any event.
• A few plots on Oakleigh and DR remain vacant so Sec agreed to contact people at the top of the waiting list. There are currently approximately 44 people on the waiting list. The top 10 are requests for LP site only as there has been no new plots to let on LP for some time.

6.    Vice Chairman’s Report:

• Nothing to report other than LP site is still looking very tidy at the moment.

7.    Treasurer’s Report:

• Treasurer not present – no figures available

8.    Sites:

• Derrell Road
  • PLEASE CONTINUE TO LEAVE MAIN GATE UNLOCKED WHEN ON SITE
  • 3b – very overgrown. Is plotholder working it at all?
• Oakleigh
  • 29a – does not appear to have been worked this year – letter required
  • 29b – letter
  • 37a – plotholder has confirmed that he is keen to keep the plot, but sec is to send a letter just to ask when work will start.
• Lower Penns
  • 19a – letter asking intentions as plot has grassed over to a degree.
  • 25b ? – letter

9.    AOB:

• A committee member reported that there was a large raised drain cover outside the gate at Derrell Road which, in her opinion, was a major tripping hazard. Chairman agreed to go and have a look at it and if necessary, contact SWW to report it. Please be careful when walking towards the DR gate.
• The leaning wall along the Batson Gardens/Oakleigh site was discussed and the Chairman said that he had been so see it. He was trying to contact the Council to arrange a meeting for them to come and look at it as it is their responsibility to repair. Sec agreed to see if she could find a contact at the Council from historic emails to come and inspect the wall.
• A committee member reported that the PHGAS website looked like it needed updating as she thought the list of last year’s committee members was still on it. Sec agreed to have a look and pass a new list of committee members to the webmaster.

10.    Date of next committee meeting:

• To be held on Monday 3rd June 2019 at 7.30pm at the RAOB Club.
  (Apologies from Secretary and Jackie Green as both will be unable to attend)

 
Meeting closed at 8.10pm.