Logie Primary School Parent Council, Friends of Blairs Loch and Forres In Bloom to be awarded support from the Co-op Community Fund
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THREE local projects are involved in a supermarket funding scheme where customers choose who to support.
Every time members buy selected Co-op branded products and services, a donation is made from the Co-op Community Fund to the causes selected - the choice now is Logie Primary School Parent Council (LPPC), Friends of Blairs Loch or Forres In Bloom (FIB) - their awards will be announced in the Autumn.
LPPC is fundraising for its local community café ‘Cup of Joy’.
A spokeswoman explained: “It is run as a social enterprise, enabling the children to raise money for the school’s ‘No Child Left Behind’ policy. When P6 and P7 go on residential trips, we ask families how much they can afford to pay. The takings from Cup of Joy help make up the difference.”
The children make soup, bake cakes and biscuits, take orders, serve at tables, take payments and do the washing-up.
The spokeswoman said: “Lunch is served to visitors at Edinkillie Hall. We would appeal for support from anyone with an interest in seeing our young people add to their communities. And we would love more people to come for lunch!”
LPPC hope to expand the school allotment, grow more fresh herbs and vegetables, and purchase seating, supplies and storage.
LPPC treasurer, Aileen Pistone, added: “We’re hoping to raise at least £1200 for cooking and serving supplies. We’d also like to do more work at school on the basics of food production, provide the children with gardening tools and seeds, and expand our raised bed area.”
Friends of Blairs Loch hope to make recreational facilities and trails at the beauty spot as accessible and inclusive as possible. This means creating areas for recreational wheelchair and restricted mobility users on land and water.
Next year the loch will be re-stocked for recreational boat fishing so any funds the group receives through the Coop community fund will be put towards a second boat for it.
Friends treasurer Brian Higgs confirmed the site has one boat at the moment, purchased for use by volunteers carrying out maintenance work as well anglers.
He said: “We have identified a suitable boat which will cost around £5000 but we also need to provide a suitable access way to it. The total cost of the project will probably be around £7-8000.”
He added: “We have put a lot of work into creating wheelchair accessible paths around the boat house and Swan bird hide. The big challenge for us now is to open up the water for disabled, and less able-bodied visitors via a second boat that has been designed and fitted out for this purpose.
“We are extremely grateful to Coop customers for their support.”
FIB use some self-watering hanging baskets, window boxes and barrels, and are working towards having all containers self-watering.
FIB secretary Sandra Maclennan said: “We are gradually replacing containers in town for those which have reservoirs, These use less water and need to be topped up less. We are funded mainly by donations from local people. Co-op voters have helped us in the past and we hope they will do so again.”
Co-op members can choose which of the causes their donations will go to by selecting via the Co-op app or website.
The next round of applications for 2023 goes live on May 10 and local groups are invited to email kay.ford@coop.co.uk for information.
