This is a brief summary of our meeting. The minutes will be available in a few days.
Our guests included our two Councillors Gayle Gander and Ola Kolade, three from the Metropolitan Police, PCSO Karolina Aamir, PC Chris Woods and Sgt. Nathaniel Gates.
Police
Sergeant Gates, the officer in charge of the Kenley Safer Neighbourhood Team, was first to address members. He warned that as the nights get longer, burglars become more active and asked that we all take extra care in main sure our homes are secure. He suggested that lights be left on and vigilance should be heightened.
Speeding was high on his team’s list of priorities and now that they have a new radar gun, they are putting it to daily use. He said that he had to move their operations frequently, as drivers were using Waze to warn about speed traps. He had had ‘words’ with several drivers who were exceeding the speed limit to encourage better behaviour. One driver was found to be driving without insurance and will be fined and given six points on his licence.
Save The Kenley Campaign (STK)
Committee member and Chair of the Save The Kenley campaign committee, Fareita Pauli, made a presentation showing the progress of the campaign, and said they were waiting for the Financial Conduct Authority to approve their application to form a Community Benefit Society. This was key the the next step of issuing shares to purchase and renovate the Kenley Hotel when in comes onto the market. Fareita said it was vital that local residents were behind the campaign and would use the pub when it was reopened.
There has been a massive effort to engage with residents to get their views on the STK. Gloria, in charge of Community Engagement, told how volunteers have been knocking on doors throughout the ward, asking residents to give their opinions and preferences about the future of the Kenley Hotel, should the community be able to buy it. They have covered around two thirds of the roads in Kenley so far. The results of the survey for June and July were published in the Autumn issue of KENDRA magazine.
Robin Brownsell, an STK Committee Secretary, told members about his involvement with the campaign and how he had been in a similar community pub takeover in Hove.
Mark Dodds, a publican and director of CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale) was invited to respond to a comment from a member, who said she had lived in Kenley for over forty years, visited the Kenley Hotel twice, and didn’t like it. Why would members want to go there if it was reopened?
Mark said lack of investment by pubcos was a common theme, and that the onus was then on the publican to carry out the upkeep of the pub, this was impossible when they made little or no profit. The pub running down was inevitable.
Fareita made the point that this was exactly why the community should take the opportunity to make the Kenley Hotel a place that we would all want to go to, no just restore the pub to how it was in the past.
Changing KENDRA
Committee Vice-Chairman, Paul Keating, said that the Save the Kenley campaign was exactly the type of activity that our association should be involved in, bringing us all together to make Kenley better.
He said that he and Cllr. Gayle Gander had met with the Croydon Council’s Director of Streets and Environment (Charlie Baker) to discuss how we could work together to improve how Kenley looks. For example, the Council has promised to give Kenley parade a thorough clean and provide troughs to plant flowers. (more on Prettifying Kenley here).
Paul went on to explain how changing KENDRA from an unincorporated association to a Company Limited by Guarantee was important, mainly for the protection of committee members.
As things stand, if KENDRA was sued for some reason, say because of a incident that wasn’t covered by public liability insurance, or that KENDRA was found to be negligent, committee members (and theoretically all members) would be personally liable. They could lose their homes and everything they owned. This risk is unacceptable, no matter how unlikely.
By becoming a Company Limited by Guarantee, the committee and members liability would be limited to £1 each. KENDRA would need to registered with Companied House and submit accounts, but investigation into the amount of paperwork involved was not as onerous as had been thought. The costs too would be around £50 – £250 annually depending on what level of registration we decided.
The Vice-Chairman said a full consultation document would be made available so that members would fully understand what the change would mean. KENDRA in its current form would need to be dissolved and wound up.
One member said she thought this change had already been decided years ago, but didn’t happen because it was seen to be too complicated. Paul Keating said that that discussion had stalled and no progress had been made. However his investigations into the change showed it was not as complicated as was feared. It just needed the approval of the membership.
This Is Kenley Video
In 1997, a video was made by the Miller Centre Camera Club for KENDRA, entitled This Is Kenley. This was a substitute for Roger Packham’s presentation. Probably overlong, it was interesting to see how Kenley had changed and was now a much busier place. It was evident that KENDRA was much more involved in the community than it is now, and it had a much larger membership. A committee meeting is packed with members, or was that just for the camera? You decide, click the link to view This Is Kenley video.
Should we do a remake?
Our Councillors
Huge thanks to our Councillors for sticking with us. Their session in hindsight should have been earlier. Ola told of the progress that had been make in improving the roads. He also expressed his delight that the STK was progressing well and said that the Council was behind saving the pub and recognised its importance as a community asset.
Gayle reiterated the commitment of the Council to help with KENDRA’ s prettifying initiative.
She then went on to say that new government legislation had weakened he hand of residents’ associations in their objections to planning. While individuals could object as before, the group objections by the likes of KENDRA were no longer taken into consideration.
(Clarity on this will follow. There’s a meeting on 12th October about the London Plan, Local Plan and National Scheme of Delegation. We will report back).
The meeting ended at 21.45
OUR THANKS TO ALL OUR GUESTS, CONTRIBUTORS and MEMBERS FOR ATTENDING.