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Andy Myatt

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  1. Herefordshire Council's proposal for the Belmont Library in Financial Year 2017-18, commencing 1 April 2017, is that the library reverts to opening hours of 22.5 per week, staffed by professional librarians and South Wye Community Association is not to receive any payment from them for renting this facility. How SWCA is expected to meet the overheads of the Belmont Community Centre, when a large part of its facilities is occupied by a non-paying guest, consuming its resources, is literally the £10,000 question. SWCA is a registered charity, constituted to undertake "good works" in the South Wye Area, but whether its remit extends to baling out Herefordshire Council, and gifting them a free ride in part of the Belmont Centre, may be stretching the Association's constitutional, best intentions a league too far. So there is no misunderstanding, the trustees and volunteers of South Wye Community Association want to retain (and develop) the Belmont Library for the benefit of the wider local community. It currently has a footfall of 40,000 visitors per year, of all ages residing in the City, Belmont Rural Parish and most of the villages in the South of Herefordshire. However, I recognise the unsubtle difference between symbiosis and parasitism, and there is no such thing as a free meal!. The proposal is unacceptable. I maintain that the Association should not be required to voluntarily bleed itself to death financially, by Herefordshire Council, in order to support the latter's own inadequacy, and to establish a Belmont Community Library. All is yet not lost.. SWCA, including the writer, will try hard to get alternative income to keep the library open, but the clock is ticking. This is my opinion and not that of the other SWCA trustees. Andy Myatt Trustee & treasurer SWCA.
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