I’m back from my holidays and feeling relaxed and refreshed. Huge thanks to Morag for keeping the blog going in my absence and Geoff for his continuing work on that matter. Morag did fabulously and it was harder than usual as, with a few folks on hols, there was slightly less to-ing and fro-ing on Porty Central business. She handled it brilliantly, imaginatively and in her own inimitable style. Thank you Morag! This is my #33 out of my planned 100 blogs, picking up from my last one #32.
I’m not someone who switches off emails and social media when on holiday but I look at it on my terms and usually choose to read but not reply in a detached fashion. This means I don’t have tons of Porty Central emails to wade through after my hols but there are a few I need to go back and read more carefully. I’m looking forward to the Monday night meeting tonight – it didn’t take place last two weeks – so there will be plenty to catch up on, I’m sure. Damian has pulled together an agenda for it.
Big news I did pick up was the SCIO registration is through from OSCR. Portobello Central is now a charity! A few details to work out on that, not least around banking which Geoff has been handling. I’ll need to read the email about being a SCIO trustee properly soon! Know there has been some good comms work going on in the background and I look forward to seeing the output of that in the coming weeks.
Other news from my point of view is that we didn’t put in for this round of Scottish Land Fund money. I had the application form started and it was hanging over me a bit last weekend but I would have got it in, one way or another. However it wasn’t sitting right. We didn’t know well enough what to ask for – timing is everything in these applications and our timings were just not meeting theirs. We didn’t have our shopping list ready to put down in a form. Also SLF is very focused on ownership (understandably so and we’ve always known that). Our very helpful SLF advisor clarified:
‘If you are awarded a technical assistance grant you need to complete all work and have spent the grant before sending us your stage 2 application. We expect you to submit your stage 2 application within 6 months of the date of your stage 1 confirmation letter. Therefore, if it you don’t intend to acquire full ownership of the building in the next year or so, my advice would be to delay your application to the Scottish Land Fund.’
With so many balls up in the air right now that settled it and we decided not to put the application in this time. It runs every three months and we are still working things along with the Architectural Heritage Fund for now. With that decision, I was able to properly switch off and fully enjoyed my time with the family in wildest Perthshire. Favourite bit was probably climbing Ben-y-Vrackie for a friend’s birthday on Saturday in glorious sunshine albeit with wild winds. The views were amazing.
Mountaineering metaphor anyone?
Jen’s Blog #33