John Doherty, Mentor for North East England
Pigeon lofts, leeks and allotment gardening have been part of the culture in North East England for as long as anyone can remember. However, communities change and it is not unusual to see a former allotment site in a very sorry state. Often there is the nucleus of a local group trying to keep sites going, or someone with a vision wants to create cultivation and re-birth out of decay. This is where ARI can and does help.A bit of mentor support using some of the ARI fact sheets or samples of essential documents can usually get things moving at a local level. Forming associations, self-management, agreements, rents, water, sanitation are regular issues but funding is always top of the list, with security coming a close second. As an allotment secretary, a regenerator and a successful fundraiser, I can pass on advice firsthand and encourage those that want to regenerate a site.
There have been some spectacular examples of successful allotment
regeneration recently with communities coming closer together as a
result. But ARI's work is not confined to plotholders - local authority
allotment officers and clerks to councils are now coming together to
learn from each other and from visiting speakers: see opposite for more
about the North East Allotments Officers Forum.
First published: ARI Newsletter Spring 2007