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On 6th July, one of our very valued and proactive volunteers, Rupert Holroyd will be taking part in a Skydive to raise funds for volunteers to continue our activities around the Holme Valley.

Please support this personal challenge and an opportunity to show your appreciation with a donation no matter the amount, all will be gratefully received and used to continue improvements wherever they are needed.

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/rupert-holroyd

Thank you for your support as ever.

Win. Harrison

 

Well, what a week it’s been, non stop on the move so no time for moss growing on our shoes.

With the Festival of Folk coming up this weekend starting on Friday, we wanted to make Holmfirth as inviting as we could.

So, on Monday evening we arranged for 24 Honley Beavers together with a dozen parents to litter pick around Sands Rec. on both sides of the River Holme, upto the Holmfirth Cricket Club. This also helped them with earning a Community badge, so a “win – win” for everyone.

Earlier on the same day, plants were collected from Kirklees Polytunnels in Huddersfield after receiving a request for any plants to brighten up the outside of Pattern Principle and Seams So Easy, Victoria Street.
As you may have noticed, Kirklees cuts have meant no bedding plants in Holmside Memorial Garden or the planters around Holmfirth Town Centre. So, businesses need to bring some colour to our streets the best they can and to fill the hanging baskets provided to them free over the past couple of years from Holmepride – Community in Action.

No sign cleaning in this report although requests have been received from Meltham (to clean a few more signs we missed last time out), plus Stocksmoor and Almondbury, both outside the Holme Valley but if we can share what can be done further afield, then it may encourage more people to help in their own villages.

Our next venture out traffic and street name cleaning will be w/c 19th May, so if you know of any road or street names that need a tidy up, this is your opportunity to let us know and can be added to our mental “to do” list.

Tuesday, now this project on a very hot day in the centre of Holmfirth was carried out by Diane and Rupert.

There were two metal rails that looked out of place with all the other improvements happening locally and needed prepping with sanders before getting painted.

These rails ran from the bus terminus up towards Sainsbury’s along the side of the River Holme. Our old friend “black Hammerite” has transformed a “sad looking” to “banging looking”. This has been on the cards to be tackled for quote a while so now “tick” job done and well done guys.

Wednesday, the Primulas we put into the 6 troughs up at the Holme Valley Memorial Hospital Cenotaph suffered after the hot spell. So, even after watering some will need replacing. Additional plants of a different kind (Primulas no longer available) were bought from Hampsons in Wakefield. These will be planted before a gathering at the Cenotaph this Thursday at 11am if anyone wishes to join come along to commemorate VE Day – 8th May.

Thursday, more litter picking was undertaken by Holme Valley (Holmfirth) Thursday Scouts, who litter picked Victoria Park.

More Scouts were going to remove weeds along Hollowgate and along walls on Tuesday this week but due to unforeseen circumstances, this has had to be postponed for later in the season.
Books continue to be fed into the School Street Book Swap Library and it was nice to witness a young boy come along to School Street and tell his Nan “there’s the Library” as he ran upto it, that was so nice to witness.

Oh! we now have an arrangement with The Civic to keep their gardens tidy and lawn cut which was also carried out a week ago on a Sunday morning.

Well, hope you’ve had a great Bank Holiday and enjoy this coming weekends Festival of Folk.

Win & Karen xx

Thankfully the weather was (relatively) kind to us on Sunday 13th April at the top of Holme Moss for our group litter pick.

In total we had 12 volunteers join us which included a few girls from Holmfirth High School who were volunteering as part of their Duke of Edinburgh Bronze award.

We collected a variety of random objects Including a metal car bumper, a plastic sledge and some items of clothing to name a few. We filled 15 bin bags in the space of 1.5 hours which just goes to show how much litter is strewn up there.

A few of our volunteers noticed some larger items which had been fly tipped (furniture and ceramic toilet) these will be reported to Kirklees Council for removal.

All the larger items and bin bags are now safely deposited at the local tip.
Thank you to everyone who gave up their time and came along.

OTHER NEWS

It has taken many months to get the next task over the line as nobody would take ownership of a stone step that came loose between Beatties Deli and Sid’s Cafe. No one would own up to be the owner of the steps ( Kirklees, Parish Council, Church, landlords of businesses within the courtyard). Long story short, Paddy Brook, a local builder by trade, came to the rescue and reset the stone step that came loose. Many thanks Paddy your hard work is much appreciated.

The Church caretaker / warden of the Methodist Church in School Street approached us regarding the state of the Book Swap Library in School Street as the base had become rotten. Our volunteer, Chris Van Dyke, is going to replace the rotting bottom later in the year. This very popular Book Swap Library will be able to be used for many more years to come. Many thanks in advance Chris.

A quick tidy up of the pavement leading to Muslin Hall Garage was undertaken as it was covered with rotting leaves and dead firs from the nearby trees, the road sweeper is unable to get to this part so a quick brush and tidy cleared up the area.

An area which was heavily littered was the banking down Bramble Bank off the main road towards Holmfirth. Carol and John Murphy very kindly offered to litter pick down there, they collected over 50 filled dog poo bags along with 2 very heavy bin bags full of rubbish. Thanks to Carol and John for helping make this area much tidier it is really appreciated.

The signs around the Holme Valley Memorial Hospital were looking a little bit grubby so out came our brush and water to give them a little bit of attention. Whilst there we also noticed an overflowing bin at the side of the memorial which looked rather unsightly next to the new memorial benches. We wrote to our contact at the NHS and this was swiftly emptied 👏 👏

Northern Gas Networks have removed the unsightly graffiti from the green cabinet up by the High School recreation ground. Unfortunately we forgot to take a before picture of the offending item but this has made a big difference.

Last but definitely not least, we received a very kind donation from Jules Whale and her husband recently. Any donations are greatly appreciated and go towards things like plants, new tools or are put towards bigger projects we are working on. Many thanks Jules to you and your husband.

There are plenty more projects we are working on behind the scenes and we will provide you with updates when we have them. A massive thank you to everyone who volunteers and supports us it really means a lot, till next time.

The group has been really busy making the Holme Valley look even better from repainting the gates to the war memorial at Holme Valley Hospital to removing graffiti on the way up to Victoria Park.

We have also been working with the Kirklees to remove the old metal bins with concrete bases around Holmfirth and replace with new ones. Two other bins (outside the Picturedrome and in Victoria Park) are also being pursued to get replaced/removed, the latter needing Kirķlees Parks and greenspaces approval.

Outside the Holmfirth Toilets there was an old “needles” bin that was always overflowing with rubbish stuffed into it, not a great first impression of our town, so after a couple of years of trying, this has now gone, “hurrah”!.

There was an old dumped brown bin left outside Holmfirth Post Office which was without a lid and overflowing with rubbish after filling with rain water over the early months of this year. So this couldn’t carry on, so the rubbish was taken out and bin emptied of water, with both rubbish and bin getting disposed of over Meltham Refuge Centre.

The daffodils that were kindly donated in previous years have begun to flower and look amazing.
We removed all of the weeds and dead branches from the steps outside Carl Robinson’s Clinic and steps which has made a huge improvement to the start of Hollowgate.

We have noticed some signs which are in need of replacing, these have been reported to Kirklees Highways so hopefully will be replaced soon.

Next project is to repaint the handrails down the slope from Sainsbury’s in the bus station (Town Gate) car park, plus more road traffic signs cleaned leading out of Meltham and around Wilshaw to name a couple of identified areas needing improvement.

Thanks for all your lovely comments and support, we really appreciate it.

Well, that was fun! On Sunday, 23rd March it stayed dry for the 23 volunteers that came along to help tidy up the start of the snicket that leads down from New Mill Road, past SP Designs and Holmfirth Fresh Fish towards Miry Lane, Thongsbridge.

We encourage young folk to join in on our community projects, and welcomed 4 young Holmfirth High School ladies., 3 of which needing to complete 12 hours working on projects over 6 events that are part of tasks needing to be undertaken towards achieving their Duke of Edinburgh Bronze Award.

Prior to Sunday we asked the Holme Valley unity if anyone could help us by cutting down a very large tree that had fallen over the snicket just past Holmfirth Fresh Fish. We struck gold, as on a Wednesday, Peaked Tree Services came down (Robert and his son) and did a fantastic job, not only cutting this huge tree down but shredding most of it too, cutting the trunks and branches into manageable pieces.

The snicket is safe again to walk under and opened up to let the light back in. Nearly all of the trunk pieces have since been taken by people who will keep them for their wood burners next Winter.

Then 2 days later on the Friday, we welcomed Thomas Bray who offered to cut down yet another fallen tree further down the snicket. Again, another great service was provided by an experienced professional, carried out safely as was before with again, all tree trunks were collected by people for using next Winter.

Our gratitude for both Robert, his son and Thomas Bray for their time, given freely, to make these will travelled walkways clear for all to use and enjoy.

Neighbours backing onto the snicket also came along to help, which stretched from near New Mill Road to a limited distance along the snicket.

The DoE girls were tasked to tackle an incredible amount of litter and glass from the adjoining slopes, not just the first section of the snicket, but the whole length.

All volunteers worked as a team, some using, hand tools, while others Strimmers needed to cut through the dense brambles that hadn’t been cut in years.

NO – Nesting Birds, Hedgehogs, Bee’s or Mice were seen or disturbed in the area we were able to attend to over a four hour period we worked.

Our intention is to make this snicket a much nicer place to walk down next year with the installation of c.1,000 daffodil bulbs in the Autumn after a final survey of growth during the coming seasons.

We would like to also like to thank the following for their support :

• Local neighbour Jill Dunford for baking some delicious cookies “Chocolate Chip”- “Butterscotch” – Mini Eggs”, all well received when volunteers took a well ear.ed break around 11:30am. Jill also provided flasks of Hot Chocolate plus toilet facilities if needed, thank you Jill x.
• Bluebird Bakery in Holmfirth also provided a supply of Chocolate Brownies and Flapjacks.
• Holmfirth Co-op provided biscuits and bottled water.
• Holmfirth Fresh Fish, allowung us to put a quantity of filled builders bags into their weekly skip, which has been such a help.
• SP Designs for a great deal on the printing of 12 new hi-vis tabards which helps us tremendously with our groups finances.

We, as a group always bring with us a large hot water dispenser for tea and coffee plus an ample supply of sugar and cups of course.

In total, 12 builders bags and 11 black bags were either filled with green waste or litter related items, which included much glass.

There is so much more we could report on that’s been happening which will have to wait for now, but you will notice something’s yourself if walking around Holmfirth Town Centre.

Thank you to all the volunteers and those who follow us – current following of 3,324 and growing fast.

Win, Karen and all Holmepride-CiA volunteers.