Ian Downing is set to become the new Chair of The Flavel in Dartmouth on March 1.

He explained: Firstly thanks to Ann Green the outgoing Chair for her excellent work.

“My job as the Chair is to try to understand the running of the business of the charity and how we should meet the needs of all the people in Dartmouth.

“We have a broad community, we have lots of different interests:

“There are people who might want to watch high-quality drama live from the National Theatre.

We have a wide range of quality films appealing to all ages from children to adults.

“We have bands playing and it's about managing all of our programme and making sure that we provide for our very broad community in Dartmouth.

Ian went on to explain about Flavel Forever:

“The campaign has been running since October and we've actually managed to raise £35,000 towards our target of £75,000.

“We've got 215 supporters signed up for the campaign and our target is 500 so we're really trying to get at least halfway within the next month.

“People have been kind enough to donate money to us and that's helped us in the financial year 2024-25, it's helped us to avoid the real risk that we might have had to call in the insolvency consultants.

“We have also started to plan other projects that form part of the campaign.

“One of the projects was around getting solar panels on the roof and getting battery support for that.

“We've been examining the inefficiencies of our current heating and air conditioning system and the application for lottery funding has been completed.”

They are now putting in for planning permission to get solar panels on the roof.

In addition, they would like to expand the cafe by sharing the challenge with the library charity (Libraries Unlimited) who understand that unless they can support them and work together, there is a risk to both organisations.

They want to move the cafe, extending it into the children's areas.

Ian added: “It's about us as trustees trying to generate ideas about how we can expand our provision, how we can improve things and, crucially, how we can make it sustainable in a financial sense.”

It's the 20th birthday year this year and Ian said there is plenty going on:

“There's a party coming up and then we've got a range of fundraising events happening during the year: bands playing orchestras, special events, the book festival in September, and a range of other things.

“We've been developing much more interesting programmes which have been sold out over the last few weeks, and it's exciting to see that we are hitting the spot with our Dartmouth community.”

People have been sending in testimonials such as: “Dartmouth without the Flavel would be a lesser place to live”, describing it as: “A priceless asset on so many levels”, “A jewel set in the heart of Dartmouth” and commenting “It is vital that the future of this community hub is maintained for the next generation of users.”

Visit: theflavel.org.uk for more information.