A MESSAGE FROM PETER SCHROEDER – Retiring Chair
On standing down from the Chair
• Honoured guests and fellow Association members, good morning. Firstly, my apologies for not being with you today but I know the meeting is in excellent hands with Roy in the chair. Roy is kindly stepping in for Andrea who is most unfortunately unwell and I’d like to send her my very best wishes for a speedy recovery.
• This AGM sees a number of Executive Committee members stepping down including myself as age takes its toll.
• You may be wondering how my chairmanship all started. Well as a very new Canford Cliffs resident in April 2023 I attended a BPCCRA AGM. The Chairman at the time, John Sprackling, had stood down, partly because of
age, and the acting chairman, Dugald Eadie, was leaving the area so the search was on for a new chairman. There was the usual lack of keen volunteers and Helen, my wife, prodded me, telling me I could do this, it can’t be any more demanding than chairing a college board of governors and I might even enjoy it. So, I put my hand up. After the departing acting chairman had assured me there was relatively little work involved, I found myself “in post” at the relatively young age of 84!
• Before I go there are a few things I need to cover:
o My thanks to all those members who have worked for the Association over the last few years: as members of the Executive Committee; as Street Wardens; as volunteer gardeners. I can’t list all the many names but special thanks to two retiring members of the Exec Committee, John Gunton (the editor of Pines and Chines for many years) and Roy Pointer who has been our guide to the labyrinth of BCP bureaucracy and fount of knowledge concerning our past activities.
o Also, many thanks to Andrea Charman who took over the roles of Secretary and Vice Chair, to Stanley Peters who became our treasurer and Annabel Stemp who as the new editor of Pines and Chines is taking it to new heights of excellence.
o Another thank you must be to our Ward Councillors over the years whose support for our activities has been invaluable.
• Of the many things the Association has been involved in.
o I have lingering memories of one battle lost: the sell off of the Beach Road Car Park. Though this fight is not over the Association needs to make sure the Council honours its promise to renovate the remaining unsold
part and reinstate as a car park.
o On positive achievements, I’m happy to recall the defeat of BCP’s crazy parking charge proposals; the real progress in getting important road safety measures agreed and implemented, a battle lead by the indomitable
Vicky Moss; the rebuilding of the Pinecliff Garden shelter and commissioning of the new mural. I have not mentioned the steady stream of unsatisfactory planning proposals that have been rejected, thanks in no small measure to John Harkness’s well- argued objections placed on our behalf.
• It just remains for me to wish Andrea and her team, and the Association in general, all the very best for the coming years. I hope to continue helping in various ways (without hopefully getting in the way!)
Yours
PETER SCHROEDER
