CGDTThe Development Trust received notification today that our application to acquire a right to buy on the Glendaruel Hotel has been accepted by the Scottish Ministers, and that copies of the application have been sent to the present owners. A prohibition on the sale of the property is now in place.
We will now await the response of the owners, and thereafter the determination of the Minister.
Written by Munro Gauld, the business plan has now been submitted as part of our application to the National Forestry Land Scheme.
Our thanks to Munro for all his hard work.
To read the document, please download it from our publications page.
Colintraive and Glendaruel Development Trust was supported in the production of this Business Plan by Highlands & Islands Enterprise.
Over the last month or so we have been fine-tuning our application to the Leader Broadband Challenge Fund for a significant upgrade to our internet connectivity as a community. The application went in today, and we’re keeping our fingers crossed. What makes this particularly exciting is that alongside being able to offer everyone in Colintraive and Glendaruel a significantly better connection, we’ll be employing a couple of people on a part-time basis to install and help households get their new, faster and more reliable connections working.
A red letter day for the communities of Colintraive and Glendaruel: the application for the Community Right to Buy on the Glendaruel Hotel has been sent in to the Community Assets Branch in Edinburgh. This should be received on Monday (weather permitting) and the process of informing the owners of the application will begin.
This is the first step in a long process to acquisition, and if all goes well with this stage, the working group’s next task will be to sketch out the basis for the business plan. No small task of course, but if the enthusiasm, good will and expertise which was brought to bear on the application is applied to this document, then there is no doubt that what is presented to the community for its consideration will be thorough-going and compelling.
… Please contact Rhona through the contact page letting her know, and she’ll forward you another set. We’ve had a single report of non-arrival of ballot papers and we just want to ensure everyone gets the chance to vote on this, the most important opportunity the community has ever had the chance to vote on.
At the end of September you’ll also receive a further letter from us, which will include the Executive Summary of our finalised business plan. This will give you the fullest picture possible of our business intentions towards Stronafian Forest.
Both animateurs handed their reports in today, and very pleasing reading they make too. Lots of interesting and varied points have come back from the community, much of which has helped in directing the information we will have available on Sunday for the Stronafian Sandwich at the Glendaruel Village Hall. We’ll publish the documents shortly for everyone to access (they’ll also be on noticeboards and by request from directors).
Rhona and I also had a short meeting to look at the ballot for the NFLS, more of which on Sunday.
As part of the progress toward our application to the NFLS, today the District valuer David Herriott came to look over the forest, and myself and Michael Kaufmann accompanied him for the morning. It was an overcast day, but the views were as impressive as ever.
We also looked at the piece of deciduous woodland above the clachan. Unlike earlier in the year when we visited this piece of woodland with GorDon Gray Stephens of the Woodland Association, it wasn’t the sylvan paradise we’ve come to expect, but it was lovely nevertheless.
The valuer will report by the 10th of September in time for our big public consultation day, the Stronafian Sunday Sandwich — more of which later!
Just a quick note to report that two working groups were formed on the 4th in Glendaruel, one to look specifically at the Hotel, and the other at a community hub or Pavilion.
As I write the Hotel group have begun collecting signatures for a petition under the Community Right to Buy legislation in order to acquire the right to buy the property. Members of the working group and the development trust board will be visiting as many folk as they can to offer the opportunity to sign the petition.
Rhona and I are presently preparing the draft of an application to LEADER for a broadband project to take advantage of a 1M euros fund the government have just announced. Luckily we have the Cadispa report to evidence much of what we say, and we also have some template documents to help with the technical side of things, but it is a bit of a rush. The draft will be presented to the board at our next meeting (25th July) and we’ll report thereafter.