Rural Community Gateway

COSLA Award for Skye & Lochalsh Community Toolkit

Congratulations to the Skye & Lochalsh Community Toolkit partnership project, who scooped the Advancing Community Well Being COSLA Excellence Award at a glittering ceremony held in St Andrews on 8th March 2007.

The Skye & Lochalsh Community Toolkit is an online resource that includes a wide range of information and guidelines on everything from constitutions to applying for funding. You can read more about the project in the Your project they recently contributed to the Rural Gateway.

Chrisanne MacDonald from Skye & Lochalsh Council for Voluntary Organisations said, "We are delighted that the Skye & Lochalsh project has won this Award. The Community Toolkit resource is immensely popular, offering positive benefits and support to so many local community groups, and it is fantastic that its excellence has been recognised by COSLA."

In fact, the toolkit has proved so popular that some of the content is now available as a syndicate feed to other Councils for Voluntary Service across Scotland. If your CVS would be interested in benefiting from the Community Toolkit, contact Michelle Seviour at SLCVO on 01478 612 921 or email michelle@slcvo.org.uk

Forestry Commission launch Touchwood

Forestry Commission Scotland have launched an exciting programme of events to celebrate Highland 2007, the year that Scotland celebrates Highland culture, called touchwood.

Upcoming events include a touchwood festival celebrating Highland trees, woods, forests and environments to take place in Dingwall and a range of astronomy events called Dark Sky Scotland. The Commission also hopes to build a 300-seat covered forest amphitheatre in Canmore Wood near Dornoch, and are working with Scottish Natural Heritage on a specially adapted educational facility called the Green Machine.

Sarah Boyack, Deputy Minister for Environment and Rural Development said, "Forestry Commission Scotland has embraced and actively supported Highland 2007 since the very early stages of this Scottish Executive initiative. touchwood will engage communities, educate, showcase Scottish forestry now and in the past, and provide people from all walks of life with additional attractions and new inspiration to visit our national forests."

A range of partners are working with Forestry Commission Scotland on this programme of events including Highland 2007, Highland Council, Highlands & Islands Enterprise network, the Scottish Executive, Scottish Natural Heritage, University of the Highlands and Islands, the Royal Observatory Edinburgh, Hi-Arts and the Community Woodlands Association.

Accident and Emergency and Mountain Rescue get together

A special training day is taking place on 16th March 2007, bringing together members of the Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team and staff from Inverness’ Raigmore Hospital Accident & Emergency department.

Participants will be able to share stories and a mountain rescue exercise will enable a better understanding of each other’s roles.

Christina McKenzie, sister in A & E at Raigmore Hosptial said, “It’s an excellent opportunity to see things from their perspective, how they deal with casualties up in the hills and what they go through on a rescue. Everyone is really looking forward to the day.”

Hamish Wyllie is a member of Cairngorm Mountain Rescue and also works for NHS Highland. He said, “The aim of the day is to spend time together appreciating both the differences in what we can do; and the important things that we can help each other with. After all, we are really all part of the same team trying to help the same people in often difficult circumstances.”

Open forum will look at rural community regeneration

The Scottish Urban Regeneration Forum (SURF) will be holding a half-day open forum in Inverness on Thursday 29th March 2007. The aim is to identify what issues, concerns and success stories are common for both rural and urban community regeneration. They also want to identify matters that are unique to rural areas.

A panel discussion will include senior representatives from Highland & Island Enterprise’s Enterprising Communities team, the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations’ rural team, Communities Scotland Highlands and Islands, Rural Environment Action Plan and the Community Woodlands Trust.

The event will be held at the Columba Hotel, Inverness starting at 9:30am with registration and concluding with an informal networking lunch at 12.30pm. Places are free, but must be pre-booked. Contact Derek at SURF on 0141 585 6849 or email Derek@scotregen.co.uk Please note that if you need to cancel you should give 24 hours notice or you may be charged a fee.

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