A new future for Sustainable Staffordshire

SENT ON BEHALF OF PAUL NEWMAN, CHAIR, SUSTAINABLE STAFFORDSHIRE

Dear Sustainable Staffordshire member

The success of Sustainable Staffordshire, since its formation in 1990, is that it has brought enthusiasts and experts together to take local action against what is now widely recognised as humanity’s greatest problem: the impact of mankind on our planet. We now need the help of all our supporters to take a new direction for the immediate future.

As some of you may be aware, Staffordshire County Council have traditionally provided Sustainable Staffordshire with administrative and financial back-up to organise meetings and events, to maintain our database of contacts and to send out communications on our behalf. This has been done alongside the County Council’s other Local Agenda 21 activities. We have recently been informed that the Cabinet of the County Council has decided to end this support from April 2008.

Its reasoning is in part to pursue other activities but also because of recent, well-publicised, budgetary constraints. However, the County Council has proposed to make available a much smaller amount of money than has previously spent to help us to make the transition into the voluntary sector. The problem is that Sustainable Staffordshire does not currently have its own legal identity and so we are unable to bid for even these funds in our own right. However, we have been offered a potential life-line by the Community Council of Staffordshire (a charity of which I am a Director), which has agreed to use this money to provide us with administrative support in the short-term.

This offer does give us all the opportunity to plan what services supporters would like from Sustainable Staffordshire in the future and how they can be financed. Therefore, I enclose a questionnaire, which I shall be very grateful if you will complete and return no later than Friday 30 November 2007 so that the Management Team can know your views. This data will be shared with the Community Council of Staffordshire.

I hope that you are willing to help take our work forward at a time when it is needed more than ever. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support in the past, which I believe has been of incalculable value to our local community of Staffordshire.

Front Page | Home Page for individuals | Groups & Business Index | Site contents & internal links | Email the Author