Eastertown Common

 

Sadly, Dr Ann Codman, a greatly admired and respected Eastertown resident died in June last year. Though greatly missed, Ann will live on forever as we plan to implement her wishes for her field in Eastertown to remain a ‘green space’.

As you may remember, Eastertown Evolution got going during lock-down – to both support out community during tough times AND do our bit for the environment – and what fun we had! Things have been quiet for a while as life sort of returned to normal (or not) but we’re now back – inspired by Ann.

One of original plans was to find some land to create a community space – including a Food Forest, community garden, wildflower meadow and so much more but we didn’t have the land – until now. Helen Brown, Ann’s niece, inherits Ann’s field and wants to sell the land to our community to create a lasting legacy to Ann.

Many of us benefited from Ann’s generosity by her letting us walk our dogs in her field, when it didn’t have any livestock on it (Ann kindly ‘rented her land to our infamous local farmer and Parish Councillor in return for managing her land sympathetically) and providing we picked up the poo!

So – we have created Eastertown Community Interest Company, (CIC) this means we can access significant capital and revenue funding from the governments Community Ownership Fund - a fund set up to save parks, pubs, shops, etc that would be lost to the community if sold. It runs till March 2025 and there is £150million available.

Many of you have seen the beautiful wood Ann planted – Ann has made sure it can never be sold, her ashes are sprinkled there and we can continue to watch the trees flourish.

We have been successful in our initial expression of interest and having submitted our first full application, have been invited to apply again with a few amendments at the end of January, including spelling out what we will lose if its sold and lost to the community.