The Glenkens & District Trust
About GDT
Glenkens and District Trust (GDT) was established in 2011 and has the primary purpose of resourcing and enabling community development in the Glenkens and surrounding communities. Trustees are drawn from the community council areas of Dunscore; St John’s Town of Dalry; New Galloway & Kells; Balmaghie; Crossmichael; Parton; Corsock & Kirkpatrick Durham; and Balmaclellan. The geography, and current grantmaking arrangements covered by GDT also takes in the community of Carsphairn, though Carsphairn is not currently represented on the Board.
Community Action Planning
A community action plan has been developed to support the Trust in ensuring that the funds are distributed wisely and strategically. Work on a plan began in late 2017 and early 2018, and Community Enterprise were commissioned in late 2019 to gather the existing data together, carry out further community consultation and produce a strategic community action plan that the whole community contributed to and supported.
It is vital to note that, although the wind farm fund distribution was a key driver to initiating a plan, the reach of the plan is beyond projects funded through that source and is a road map for the whole community over the next 5 years and beyond.
In September 2020, the Glenkens & District Trust published the Glenkens & District Research Report and Action Plan.
The Research Report uses desktop research encompassing demography and statistics, an assessment of community assets and the policy context; and community consultation; including surveys, stakeholder summit and a range of community engagement events. Together these were used to pull together key findings about the nature of the Glenkens communities, the assets, opportunities and challenges faced and the key thematic priorities that local people wanted to see the Action Plan tackle.
The related Action Plan sets out an overall goal that the Glenkens will be a connected, resilient and carbon neutral place, where people will want to live, work and visit, to bring up their families, and to grow old. It will be somewhere that other places in Scotland will look to for inspiration.
The full Research Report and Action Plan can be found here; a standalone summary of the Action Plan can be found here.
Trustees
Decisions on grant awards from the Blackcraig Wind Farm Community Fund are made by The Glenkens & District Trust (GDT), the board of which comprises representatives drawn from most of the Fund’s Community Councils along with some non-Community Council representatives. The current trustees are:
Name
|
Organisation represented
|
Date of appointment
|
Des Hadnett
|
Balmaghie CC
|
5 December 2016
|
Richard Middleton
|
Crossmichael and District CC
|
5 December 2016
|
William Dickson
|
Corsock and Kirkpatrick Durham CC
|
5 December 2016
|
Fiona Smith
|
Independent
|
19 November 2018
|
Denise MacDonald Kiernan
|
Balmaclellan CC
|
29 April 2019
|
Gavin Creaney
|
Dunscore CC
|
29 October 2020
|
Rosalind Hill
|
Royal Burgh of New Galloway and Kells Parish
|
15 October 2019
|
Thomas Marshall
|
Parton CC
|
9 June 2020
|
Andrew Mellor
|
Dalry CC
|
1 July 2020
|
Julie Garton
|
Corsock & Kirkpatrick Durham
|
20 July 2020
|
Meeting Summary
You can download the summary from the most recent meetings of The Glenkens & District Trust using the links below:
December 2020
November 2020
August 2020
March 2020
May 2020
January 2020