Birchencliffe Community Centre – a popular and well used community facility in Lindley Ward – is being helped to create a play area and community garden thanks to a £10,000 investment agreed by Huddersfield Area Committee at its meeting on Tuesday 2nd October.

The centre is owned by St Philips Church and run as a non-profit organisation for the benefit of the community. It is home to a wide range of activities and clubs which promote health, welfare and social interaction whilst also offering facilities that can be booked by the community. Activities available include: Rainbows, Brownies & Guides, Beavers, Cubs & Scouts, The Mothers Union, The Cliffites Dramatic Society, Lindley Out of School Club, Kiddiecats Nursery, Weightwatchers classes, Tai Chi, Qi Gong, Tai Kwan Do, Kick Boxing, U3A Wood Carvers, Music and the Deaf and many more. The Centre’s facilities include a large multi-purpose community hall which can be used for meetings, play, sports, exhibitions, concerts, wedding receptions and family parties. It also has several other smaller meeting and function rooms.

Earlier this year, again with the assistance of the Area Committee, the Community Centre purchased a piece of land from the council so it could establish a play area and community garden for the centre. As the piece of land purchased is adjacent to a busy road and has a pronounced slope it requires fencing and some ground works to make it useable and safe.

With the support of Cllr Cahal Burke (Lib Dem, Lindley Ward) the centre has approached the Area Committee to ask for funding to carry out the required improvements so that everyone who lives in the local community can benefit from the new resource.

Future plans for the play area and community garden include a planted area with the potential for community food growing and other environmental projects which the centre will undertake fundraising to pay for involving the local community.

Cllr Cahal Burke said:

“The Community Centre at Birchencliffe is a well used community facility where people of all ages go to as members of different clubs or to take part in events – it really is a very good community facility and the only one in the local area. The land that the Centre purchased is next to a busy main road and it also needs levelling so it is safe for everyone, especially for the young people. There is no other recreational site near by so it’s really good that the centre will now have this to offer to local people and their families while the community garden space should broaden the range of things that the centre can run and host. I am very pleased that the Community Centre has been granted the funding by members of the committee and I hope that it helps the centre go from strength to strength,”

Rev’d Mary Railton-Crowder said:

The new garden and play space will be a wonderful addition to the facilities at the Community Centre. We are very grateful to Councillor Burke and the Area Committee for supporting our efforts to turn this piece of wasteland into a valuable community resource.