Charity appeal as community hub faces 'challenges'

The charity which runs a community hub in Oxted is searching for new trustees and volunteers to help make the building a success.

Master Park Pavilion Charity opened a new facility in the Surrey park just over a year ago following a £3.2m revamp which created a cafe, accessible public facilities and spaces for classes and workshops.

This new hub, created to provide an income stream for the charity-owned park, has encountered challenges since opening.

Gareth Morgan, chair of the trustees, admitted there wasn't a full appreciation of the "operational challenges" as "we came out of 'construction and build mode' into 'run mode'".

He said: "To be fair to the trustee group, none of us really have got great experience in hospitality or functioning.

"We are desperate to recruit new talent who have skills in this area, who can take the hub forward."

Morgan said the utilisation of rooms upstairs in the Park Hub stands at about 50%, a percentage the charity wants to increase with away days and other functions.

Fellow trustee Helen Hunt said everybody wanted the hub to succeed because it was such a "great asset", adding that the quest for trustees came from a desire to make the building "successful and financially stable".

The Park Hub manager, Melanie Barren, said "building anything of this size is going to be difficult" but added "any growing business" would face the same challenges.

She said: "All I see is an upward trajectory...we are very fluid, we adapt, we respond, and we all work extremely hard for it."

The Park Hub had funding of £1.86m from Surrey County Council and £500,000 from Tandridge District Council.

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