Progress: Oct/Nov/Dec 2023 - making a start

rachelbodle
Dec 18, 2023
2 min read

Potential collaborators met together and with stakeholders and agreed to champion Shaftesbury's long-term vision

October 2023

Getting volunteers together: Seven people willing to volunteer support for the project and available on this date (25th) met in a private room (the ‘Library’) at The Grosvenor Arms. After a round of introductions we assessed the amount of time (limited) and range of skills/experience (broad but not yet comprehensive) that could be available. The project was welcomed with the general principle being that this is not about ‘our’ vision but that the aim is to support Shaftesbury in discovering the community’s long-term vision. A ‘core group’ of 3 volunteers with the capacity to contribute to continuing preparatory work for the project emerged: Rachel Bodle, Hannah Nobbs & Lucy Young. Other volunteers will be ‘on call’ for specific times/topics: Ed Bersey, Bernard Ede, Charlotte & Nicholas MacKay.
Meeting between volunteers and key stakeholders: took place at Shaftesbury Arts Centre (27th), ‘stakeholders’ being people connected to organisations that make decisions affecting the town. (One aim is for the expressed vision of the Shaftesbury area community to influence these organisations.)

· Their home & children are precious to each family, people living or working here have ‘emotional capital’ in the area, they’re putting down roots and have a legitimate voice.

· Shaftesbury is a place where people do come forward to volunteer.

· Shaftesbury has been divided in the past but STC now talks of ‘one Shaftesbury’

· Project must reach people across the community: haves/have nots; regardless of IT use; people with disabilities; all ages, ethnicities, gender, location … Both Derek & Simon offered to help volunteers to access base data from the census.

· Ongoing changes relevant to the vision include: working from home/commuting; demographics; delivery of health care; use of cash; how we interact with the state and services.

· We need to recognise the important links to Gillingham, Wiltshire & Somerset.

November 2023

Rachel Bodle provided an update to Shaftesbury Youth Council (8th), providing the young people with insights to some of the preparatory activities volunteers would be likely to undertake before the project was ready for a public launch.
A core group of 4 volunteers (including Mike Madgwick) met (20th) to work out how they might approach the preparatory work needed. They generated a diagrammatic overview of workflows. The diagram and explanatory notes (accessible from here) were subsequently shared with other volunteers, including two more recent additions, along with an invitation to get involved as appropriate.

December 2023

Volunteers started to identify where they could contribute. Work will begin in subgroups in the new year.