Gorgie Memorial Hall fights closure
Staff, volunteers and users of the Gorgie Memorial Hall have launched a campaign to oppose plans to close the community facility.
It was announced last week that the ‘Gorgie Mem’, as it is affectionately known by locals, was among the six community centres earmarked for closure following the Edinburgh Council budget cuts.
The Centre’s management committee have been quick to act launching a petition and I understand that they have already collected hundreds of signatures and circulated copies of the petition to groups, organisations and individuals who use the centre as well as to other community centres in the area.
If you have access to a printer you can download a copy of the petition by clicking here. Please feel free to circulate this around your friends, neighbours and colleagues urging them to add their support and return completed forms to the address shown.
If you cannot access a printer you can contact the Gorgie Memorial Hall on 0131 337 9098 and they will be able to provide paper copies of the petition.
The Gorgie Memorial is one of only two centres providing services to the community of Gorgie. The centre is used seven days a week by a broad range of people from all backgrounds and provides a friendly and safe place for people to meet.
Among the regular activities on offer at the centre are an under 5s drop in session, a youth club, art workshops and dance classes. The building is one of very few in the area which have the capacity to cope with these sorts of youth and children’s activities and its closure would have a knock on effect in the community.
The proposed closure is all the more upsetting as the Centre’s management committee only recently invested in improving the decoration of the centre and the kitchen to make it more attractive to the range of groups using the centre.
The Council intend to hold a consultation meeting involving stakeholders to look at how the council runs its services, including community centres. Details of the meeting are as follows and I would encourage you to attend if you can. The details of the meeting are below:
Date & Time:
Tuesday March 9th 2010, 6:30pm - 7:30pm
Location:
Conference Room 1, Wester Hailes Education Centre, 5 Murrayburn Drive, EH14 2SU
The story of the closure has already attracted interest from the media and in case you missed the coverage you can read more from the Evening News and watch a report from STV.