Business Plan

Update to Business Plan

Church and Parsonage

The business plan is virtually over, after two years of planning, a year of action and the expenditure of 165,000 euros. There is a small amount of mopping-up work to do and the self-help painting team may keep themselves occupied for as long as they want, but the church and parsonage buildings are now sound and attractive. The north wall has yet to be repaired, but we expect to start this and the garden plan very soon, and these are the only major projects left in the pipeline.

The upgrading of the church electrical system is at last complete: the original timescale of six weeks extended into nine months, but no matter: we got there in the end. Meanwhile, having rewired half of the parsonage during the refurbishment programme, we had always intended to rewire the other half, that the refurbishment didn't touch, sooner or later. But teething troubles with some of the new electrical installations have persuaded us to bring forward the complete rewiring as soon as possible. This is not an extensive or expensive task - two electricians for two days - so we hope to achieve this very soon.

The carpentry in the Ranalow Room has been finished, again later than hoped for. The carpenter had his Christmas holiday but then got sacked! So our contractor had to find another one. Fortunately the second carpenter is as good as the first and the walls of the room are now lined with custom-built bookcases which the "book committee", chaired by our chaplain Neil, has now filled with books. The floor has been cleaned and stained, and the last link in this particular chain of events was the transfer of the beautiful extendable table, kindly made and donated by Charles Watson, from its temporary location in the welcome area to a room which could have been designed for it!

We now have a gleaming new ground floor kitchen. The units are in, the work surface is on, large square tiles are underfoot and the wall sparkles with rectangular ones from floor to ceiling. At the time of writing the pantry has been stripped bare and has been receiving its own new coat of paint and worktop, so everything which was, and will be stored in it, is dotted around every shelf and cupboard in the kitchen and utility room.