This weekend...

Just a reminder that there are two village events taking place tomorrow, Saturday 21st June. 

Flowers in memory of Liz,
from the Residents'' Association

There will be a memorial service at the C of E church at 11am for the late Liz Porteus who passed away earlier this year. The service will be followed by a faith-lunch at no. 7 Front Street; for more details, please see the village calendar. 

Meanwhile St Michael's Esh Laude RC Primary School are having their Summer Fair tomorrow at the school. All are welcome to attend - fingers crossed the weather holds! 

Dorothy's Wells Project Tanzania

Jim and a happy child!

Dorothy's Well Project is an Esh-based charity which raises money to drill wells in Tanzania, providing fresh drinking water to people of Africa who otherwise would have to walk for up to three hours a day to collect dirty water. Founded in 2009 by Esh resident Jim O'Connor in memory of his late wife Dorothy, the project aims to reduce the frightening statistic that every 20 seconds, a child in Africa dies of a water-related disease.

Since the sinking of the first well at Machame, north eastern Tanzania, and building of latrines at Nkoraya Primary School, a further six wells and twelve latrines have been installed in rural Tanzanian communities, all of whom were in desperate need of clean drinking water and sanitation facilities.

Each well costs around £20,000 to sink, money raised through local coffee mornings, raffles, tombolas, bring and buy sales, lunches, supermarket bag packing, and Ceilidhs, as well as sponsored events including the Coast to Coast walk and the Boxing Day North Sea Dip, and more recently, a climb of Mount Kilimanjaro which helped to kick-start the funding programme for 2013. 

To find out more about the project and how you can help, please visit their website, www.dorothyswell.org or see their Facebook page. 

Action-Stations!

Following a very productive meeting with the mid-Durham Area Action Partnership and members of the Parish Council earlier this month (see post below), the AAP have written back to the Residents' Association with a comprehensive action plan designed to highlight specific local concerns and the intended means by which to address them. 

Issues raised by village residents included road safety (stationary traffic blocking main access routes through the village, speeding, road crossings, and overgrown verges obscuring road signs), dog fouling and horse manure on pathways and the road, the regeneration of the children's play area, and ideas for opening community-run initiatives such as a village shop. 

The action plan has its own page on the blog so that all residents can see what is planned and the partnerships involved - indeed, rumour has it that the drains are due to be cleared imminently... do watch this space! 

Road Drains in Esh

A less positive post today...has anybody else noticed the poor state of the drains in the village?!

Front Street is particularly badly affected - the drains are almost overflowing with mud, horse droppings and other general debris from the road - and several residents have been trying to remedy the situation outside their houses in an attempt to prevent localised flooding.

The County Council have been informed on a regular basis about this over the past few months to no avail, although the Residents' Association have repeated been assured that our concerns have been heard and that action will be taken.

Please add your voice to those requesting that the Council urgently attend to the drainage issues in the village by emailing the Highways Action Line at Hal@durham.gov.uk and quoting the following reference number: 32113867.

Esh WI Open Evening

This Monday, 10th June, the Esh Women's Institute will be holding an open evening starting at 8.00pm in the CofE Primary School. 

Will Marx will be singing "Songs from the Sixties" and all are welcome - so whether you prefer to rock it up to the strains of the Kinks, chill to the sounds of the Supremes, sing the Folsom Prison Blues, or head back to that cradle of British pop, the Cavern Club - it promises to be a fantastic evening! For more about the Esh WI, please see the Tourism & Leisure page. 

Next Village Residents' Meeting

The next Esh Village Residents' Association Meeting will take place tomorrow evening, Thursday 6th May, in the Cross Keys at the slightly earlier time of 6.45pm. 

We will be at the meeting with the mid-Durham Area Action Partnership and Parish Council beforehand at St Michael's RC Primary School (see post below for more information) before moving on to the pub; all are most welcome to join us at the former and/ or the latter! 

As well as general updates on village life and goings-on and the contents of the forthcoming newsletter, the meeting will be discussing the possibility of financing and sourcing a village noticeboard... a more complex affair than one might think!