Doncaster Ramblers
Committee Meeting: 16th September 2019
Present: David Gadd, Tony Marsh, Peter Rowsell, Dave Binnington, Steve Robertson, Sue Robertson.
Apologies: Martin Wyman, Dennis Neal, Bob Carlisle, Lee Welsh. David Horne.
Minutes of the meeting of 15th July: Confirmed as being correct.
Matters Arising from those minutes:
DG confirmed that he had written to Marion Thompson to thank her for her contribution to Ramblers over many years.
Financial report.
DH not present
Publicity
We had a lengthy discussion re supporting Children in Need by organising a fund-raising walk. It was decided that it was too late for this year but that we would put it on a future agenda for consideration for 2020.
Publicity in the local press remains hit or miss. PR submits items regularly but has no control over whether anything will be published.
Carers Walks
The arrangements this year have been not as they should be because of the lateness of the external funding being agreed. An issue for consideration is that when, as always, the walk finishes at an attractive venue, like Wentworth House or Chatsworth, the venue is a great attraction and we have few walkers.
Get Doncaster Moving
We submitted five walks for the summer programme but only three of these walks were advertised on the GDM website. The poor turnout suggests that the public are not aware of the walks.
Rights of Way
So far 260 paths have been checked. A recent update on path faults established that 23 faults had been cleaned, 16 work orders had been raised, leaving 54 outstanding. Many of the outstanding faults are minor and in out-of-the-way places.
There is a footpath off Nursery Lane, Sprotbrough, which we hope to claim.
We have had to maintenance sessions since the last committee meeting. On 14th August seven volunteers worked on two locations in Thorpe in Balne and on 4th September a stile was modified to provide easier access for dogs off Brick Kiln Lane in Moss. An appreciative email was received from a local dog-owner.
Social Report
The Tuesday Christmas lunch will be at The Brewer’s Arms, Snaith, and the Saturday lunch will be at Clumber Park.
The AGM had been arranged and will be at The Ridgewood, Edenthorpe on Wednesday, 30th October.
Area Matters
Area Council has asked all Groups to consider what funding they might like to improve the rights of way network in their area. Area still has a significant amount of money from an inheritance. One possibility is improvements to the swampy path, Barnburgh 5. We also discussed requesting money for basic tools for square walkers so that some footpath problems could be addressed whilst square walking. TM to consider this.
AOB
Following the recent serious incident with cattle at the Magpie Mine shortly after we passed through the area we considered whether we should offer specific advice to our walk leaders. We agreed to find out what advice central office give.