A big thank you to everyone who supported our recent Village Voice Live event, which was a fascinating talk by Dr Paul Richards about the Port of King’s Lynn, Past and Present. Over forty people attended, which made it a very successful evening.

The Trustees of the Village Centre have been thinking about the future of Village Voice Live, which has suffered from a lack of support since the event restarted after the various lockdowns. The talks, which have been running for over fifteen years, will be taking a break now, but they could return if there is enough public support. We welcome your views and any suggestions for new speakers or topics.

If you want to have your say about Village Voice Live, you can contact us by email at contact@dersinghamvillagecentre.org.uk or you can reach us on our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/dersinghamvillagecentre.org.uk

If there is enough interest we will hope to organise some more talks either later this year or early in 2023. Meanwhile we take this opportunity to thank Parish Councillor Tony Bubb, who initiated Village Voice Live and has been the driving force behind it over many years!

Body Control Pilates tutor Elke is starting a new group as a Course on Thursdays at 12.30pm. The sessions will be held in the Village Centre beginning on Thursday 23rd June, so book now with Elke to reserve your place. The sessions are suitable for both men and women and are graded as beginner/refresher/moderate.

Contact Elke on 07971 440539 or email: Contrology8@gmail.com

The next of our monthly talks is this Tuesday 14th June at 7.30pm. Susan Barnett will give a talk entitled Hollywood Royalty, all about those stars of the golden era of the silver screen and spiced with secrets and scandal!

Tickets are sold on the door of the Village Centre at a cost of £6. This includes a ticket for the raffle draw and a cup of tea, coffee etc and maybe even a piece of cake!

It’s worth mentioning that Village Voice Live has been running for over fifteen years now and if the talks are going to continue, they do need your support. So, please come along and enjoy a good evening.

It’s time for our Annual General Meeting, to which all Association members are invited. Are you an Association member? Yes, if you live in Dersingham or the surrounding villages. All full-time residents are automatically members of the Dersingham Village Centre Association.

Our AGM will be held on Tuesday 24th May 2022 at 7.00pm in the main hall of the Centre. Why not come along, you can hear all about the Association’s work and have your own say about the Village Centre. Below is an outline agenda for the meeting.

1. To consider Apologies for Absence.
2. To review the Minutes of the 2021 Annual General Meeting.
3. Chairman’s Report on Operations between April 2021 and April 2022.
4. Treasurer’s Report for the 2021/22 Financial Year.
5. Appointment of Independent Scrutineer/Assessor of Accounts for 2022/23 Financial Year.
6. Nomination of Trustees to the Management Committee for 2022/23.
7. Any Other Business.
Please give details of Any Other Business to the Chairman at least 24 hours in advance of the AGM

If you would like a copy of the Minutes of the 2021 AGM then please email us at: contact@dersinghamvillagecentre.org.uk Minutes will be supplied as a PDF document.

Membership of the DVCA
Under the terms of the current constitution, any resident of the Villages of Dersingham, Ingoldisthorpe, Anmer, Shernborne, Snettisham, Heacham, Sandringham and Castle Rising are entitled to be members of the DVCA. There is no cost or charge in any way, you simply need to complete a simple form, available at all meetings of the DVCA to register your membership. We simply record your name and contact details.
Membership in the DVCA enables you to vote at meetings and to stand for the Management Committee.
For further information, please enquire using the above contact details.

After a break of a couple of months, our popular illustrated talks will return this Tuesday 12th April at 7.30pm. The speaker will be Sue Gattuso from the Swaffham Museum, who will talk about the fascinating life of Howard Carter, who famously discovered the tomb of Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun. Carter was a Swaffham resident before he left for Egypt and the museum has many tales to tell.

Tickets are sold on the door of the Village Centre at a cost of £6. This includes a ticket for the raffle draw and a cup of tea, coffee etc and maybe even a piece of cake!

Due to difficulties in obtaining suitable speakers, our Village Voice Live talks are still taking a break at the moment, so there will not be an event in the month of March.  However, we are glad to report that Village Voice Live will return, on Tuesday 12th April, when the featured speaker will be Sue Gattuso from Swaffham Museum. She will talk about Howard Carter, who famously discovered the tomb of the ancient Egyptian pharoah Tutankhamun. Carter was a resident of Swaffham before he departed for Egypt.

Update at 1pm Sunday 20th February

Following emergency repairs to the tiles on the Centre roof we are pleased to say that we have now reopened the Centre for business as usual. Our thanks to James from AC Norfolk Ltd who carried out the repairs so speedily!

The weather still looks very unsettled with more high winds forecast for the coming few days, so we we just hope that there are no further problems. Thanks to everyone for their support.

Every month there’s a chance to win a Village Centre Lottery prize. The fixed costs of the Centre are quite considerable, particularly given that energy costs are sky-rocketing, so your contributions are especially welcome. Of course, we would love to have more players so that the Centre gets even more help.

If you know anyone who would like to join the lottery then you’ll be giving us a big helping hand. It costs just £5 per month and the more players the bigger the prize fund. Anyone can join the lottery draw online by visiting our Village Centre Fundraising page Thank you for your support!

This month’s draw was made on Thursday 11th February 2022. The results are: First prize, number 2 winning £24.75. Second prize number 42 winning £16.50 and third prize number 21 winning £8.25.

Happy New Year everybody and particularly to our Lottery subscribers! Every month there’s a chance to win a Village Centre Lottery prize. The fixed costs of the Centre are quite considerable, so your contributions are especially welcome, but we do need more players. If you know anyone who would like to join the lottery then you’ll be giving us a big helping hand. It costs just £5 per month and the more players the bigger the prize fund. Anyone can join the lottery draw online by visiting our Village Centre Fundraising page Thank you for your support!

This month’s draw was made on Thursday 6th January 2022. The results are: First prize, number 63 winning £24.75. Second prize number 44 winning £16.50 and third prize number 37 winning £8.25.

It’s now over three years since the Centre opened and the Trustees felt that it was time that we reviewed the charges for hiring the various rooms in the building. At at time of rising inflation and particularly high energy prices you might expect that prices would be going up, but we have done our best to avoid that wherever possible. Only in the main hall will the hourly hiring rate increase, which is due to the cost of heating such a large space. We have had to cope with a 75% increase in the cost of energy supplied to the Centre, but fortunately, thanks to our solar panels and heat pumps the building is very energy efficient.

The cost of hiring the smaller rooms in the Centre will be either held at the current level or reduced, to encourage more use of the smaller spaces. Any changes will take effect from the 1st January 2022.

You can see all our hiring rates in the table on the Booking page of this website, but in brief the hourly rate for hiring the main hall will rise from £30 an hour to £34 (£17 for community groups). The Garden Room hire rate will be unchanged. The Loft hourly rate will reduce from £20 to £15 (7.50 per hour for community groups).

We are sure that all users of the hall will understand the reasons for these changes and, as always, we thank you all for your support.