See poster for details
Author: Strathdearn (Page 17 of 90)
SCD Community Events ✨
The month of April is packed full of amazing events at The Strathdearn.
🌲5th April – Hazelbank Woods Celebration
~Guided walks morning and afternoon (times TBC), ~Tomatin whisky coming along to do whisky tasting 6pm – 7pm, ~burgers and licensed bar available at Strathdearn and quiz night starts 7pm sharp.
To book a guided walk and secure space for the quiz night please email events@strathdearn.org
🐣12th April 2025 – Easter breakfast with Bunny
10am – 1pm
Free entry
Please book your space by emailing events@strathdearn.org
🌸26th April – Spring food, drink & craft market
11am – 3pm
Free entry
Book now to avoid disappointment all events above are free entry.
Tracy Campbell
Minute Secretary & Administrator
Email: tracycampbell@strathdearn.org
SCD AGM Voting Results
Many thanks to eveyone who attended our AGM on Tuesday evening and for everyone who sent a proxy to vote on their behalf. Your vote really did matter as you can see by clicking here for the breakdown of votes for the 5 resolutions.
We are pleased to announce all 5 resolutions passed with the required 75% vote or higher.
2025 Board Compositions
The directors on the SCD Board are:
Steven Knott – elected director
James Duncan – elected director
Duncan Bryden – elected director
Graeme Ferguson – elected director
George Macleod – elected director
Barbara MacAskill – Community Council representative
Frank Roden – Strathdearn Charitable Community Trust representative
The directors on the WRT Board are:
Sandra Edward
Steven Knott
Angus Macleod
Elizabeth Campbell
Elizabeth Campbell and Barbara MacAskill will shortly stand down.
Strathdearn Community Council
Tuesday 11th Feb @ 7.30pm in The Strathdearn
This meeting will also be available on MS Teams.
Meeting ID: 9372943720185
Passcode: jk2oj2
Click here to join the meeting
(NB: Meeting will be recorded to ensure the minutes are true and accurate)
Agenda
1. Apologies
2. Declarations of interest
3. Balfour Beatty Update
4. Minutes of the last meeting (View them HERE)
5. Matters arising
6. Financial report
7. Law and Order
8. Road Safety
9. Applications to the SCCT
- Tomatin Flower Project
10. Planning Matters
11. Windfarms
- Progress from SWIAG
12. Update from SCD
13. Correspondence
14. AOCB
Date of next meeting: Tuesday 11th March 2025
Strathdearn Community Developments (SCD) AGM, Tuesday 4th Feb, 2025 | 7.30pm | The Strathdearn
Statement from the SCD Board – Community Housing
Firstly, we hope whether via proxy, or in person, you will cast a vote on the resolutions being presented at our forthcoming AGM.
We appreciate that a wide range of thoughts exist surrounding our housing project, and that votes will be cast in consideration of the project in its entirety, and not just in relation to taking on a small element of debt financing as part of the projects’ funding (under 15% of total build costs). The need for additional housing has been long established and has been an objective of SCD since the first business plan was drawn up in 2013.
Including debt repayments, SCD funds are budgeted to pay for slightly over 55% of the total project costs with the balance coming from a Rural Housing Fund grant. Whilst we have done tremendously well to safeguard this award through the ups and downs of the project it is, we think, highly unlikely that it will be retained for the project should we not advance at this point.
Where the project does not proceed, it is possible that the site could be developed by another party and the community may have little say in what would be built there.
Please be confident that in building these six homes, and in making them available at a reasonable rent to members of our community, we hope that we will take a huge step towards reducing the need for young families to leave Strathdearn, or perhaps help those who have left to return.
In addition to providing much needed additional housing, we expect the houses to generate an annual cash surplus that can support our community’s facilities including our shop, our cafe and our hall. This would be a huge step towards creating a truly sustainable SCD and is a significant goal to aim for.
Recognising the questions that have arisen this week, we’d also like to clarify that a dedicated SCD employee will project manage the Design Team and Contractor. No additional external project management costs are envisaged.
In respect of the site, it is the only site available to us for housing and is well placed for development as it is close to existing services and utilities, indeed going back some years the Community Council had explored many other sites around Tomatin with none proving suitable. Planning concerns also supported a central site and the proximity to the school, shop/café/hall and bus stop all supported planning approval.
We look forward to seeing you on Tuesday.
With kind regards,
The Board of Strathdearn Community Developments
There will be a vote at Strathdearn Community Development Company’s AGM on Tuesday 4th Feb, 2025 to decide the future of the Community Housing project. One way or another, the result will have a lasting impact. All members are asked to attend, or vote by proxy using the form HERE.
All the information you need to make an informed choice can be found at the following link:
https://mailchi.mp/94e94132b4cd/communityhousing-and-proxy
Please read the letter below which was received by the Community Council from the Scottish Government’s R100 Evaluation Team. The R100 programme provides funding to upgrade broadband throughout Scotland.
For background: Most of Strathdearn already has the best broadband available. This was achieved by a variety of means including financial contributions and DIY cable-burying by some householders, voucher schemes. and some grant aid. There was no contribution from Scot Gov’s R100 funding.
Properties in Strathdearn still waiting for a broadband upgrade are mostly in the north of Tomatin. This work will be funded by Scot Gov’s R100 scheme. A preliminary survey was carried out last autumn by a company called Circet, on behalf of Openreach. No firm date was given for the fibre cables to be installed but we expect it to be in 2025. We can help ourselves in this regard by filling in the survey linked below, emphasising our very poor connection speeds and how long we’ve been waiting. This may prompt Openreach to bump us up their schedule. It can’t do any harm! It would be helpful if as many of you as possible respond to the survey, and particularly householders in the north of the village, before the deadline of 3 March.
The Scottish Government is investing in broadband infrastructure in your area through its Reaching 100% (R100) programme and we’re keen to get your support to help gather feedback.
The £600+ million programme is extending access to faster broadband to sub-30 Megabits per second homes and businesses who are unlikely to receive upgrades through commercial plans. You can find out more about R100 at: gov.scot/digitalconnectivity.
To understand whether and how households and organisations have benefited from R100, the Scottish Government is undertaking an evaluation of the programme. As part of this, we are surveying households and organisations who:
- Are scheduled to receive broadband access via R100 but have not yet been connected
- Have been provided with broadband access via R100 and have taken up the connection
- Have been provided with broadband access via R100 but have not taken up the connection
The surveys are available online and can be accessed at https://tinyurl.com/R100Evaluation or by scanning this QR code:
The surveys are only open to properties covered by the R100 programme. If a property is covered by the programme, the associated address will come up as an option when the property postcode is entered by the survey respondent.
Our ask of you
In a bid to reach as many residents as possible, we’re asking if you – as the local Community Council for the area – would you be able to help promote the survey in the local community by sharing the link and QR code via email and social media.
We’ve also attached a poster advertising the survey. We’d really appreciate it if you were able to display this across the community.
The deadline for all survey responses is currently 3 March 2025.
If you have any questions, please contact: R100Evaluation@stantec.com.
Thank you for any assistance you’re able to provide.
Best wishes,
R100 Evaluation Team
Read SCD’s statement below and click on this link to visit SCD’s website for further details: Community Woodland Project – SCD
SCD is thrilled to announce the successful community acquisition of Hazelbank Woods in Tomatin! 
At Strathdearn Community Developments (SCD), we’re excited to announce that, following our successful acquisition of funding from the Scottish Land Fund in November 2023, we have now completed the purchase of the first 18.5 hectares of Hazelbank Woods.
We are also confident that the remaining 2.67 hectares will be acquired shortly from Tomatin Estate such that the entire woodland will be brought into community ownership.
At this time, we would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to the sellers, the MacPherson family, for their generosity in transferring ownership of the land to the community.
We are also hugely thankful to Mr and Mrs Fleming of Kyllachy Estate who have demonstrated incredible generosity in waiving for no value, for the benefit of the community, certain pre-emption rights over the land, such that this transaction has been able to proceed. Mr and Mrs Fleming only became aware of the proposed transaction when they read about it in the Strathdearn newsletter.
Whilst land transactions are rarely straight forward, or fast to conclude, we are hugely thankful to all parties for the goodwill, patience and efforts they have exerted to help us reach this point. The contributions made by all parties truly reflect a shared commitment to our community’s wellbeing.
We wish to again thank the Scottish Land Fund for their support and also to express our deep appreciation to Macleod & MacCallum and Shepherd & Wedderburn for their legal support to SCD.
Chair of Strathdearn Community Developments Steven Knott said: “We’re thrilled to be in a position to take ownership of Hazelbank Woods on behalf of the community. This marks a significant milestone towards meeting the objectives set for us, by the community, in our Community Action Plan.
“While projects like this often take time, we are deeply grateful for the support of the Scottish Land Fund, and the goodwill of all parties to the transaction. We also extend our thanks to the community for its patience throughout this process. We’re excited to take over stewardship of the woods for the benefit of our community and look forward to celebrating this significant achievement with them.”
SCD AGM
Tuesday 4th February 2025
The Strathdearn
7:30pm
Please find below our link for anyone who isn’t a member but wishes to vote.
https://ourscd.org/membership/
Agenda, Resolutions and information on new elected directors applications will be sent out to SCD members by email within the next week.
[from chair of Community Council]
Good afternoon all,
Update on post or lack of it!
I have had a discussion with Michael and all rural deliveries have been suspended due to the weather. There is now a huge build up of mail/ parcels for Tomatin. I have arranged with Michael for him to come to the hub on Friday 10th and Saturday 11th with a big van, between 11am and 2.30pm. Anybody waiting for mail or parcels can go to the van with some id and collect. Otherwise it could be up to 3 weeks before they can clear the backlog.
Hope this helps
Rusty
