Club Chronicle

13 August 2026: Sally Medd: Chelmsford CVS

By our current standards, we had a good turnout for today’s meeting, including two guests. Six members were delayed by a grass fire next to the A12 but managed to arrive just in time. Our speaker, Sallly Medd of Chelmsford CVS, declined our invitation to lunch and turned up at the end of it to give her presentation.

Chelmsford CVS was established to support local charities and voluntary and community groups. It has a membership of 322 such organisations, including us. These vary from the local branches of national charities to groups of just a few people. Its work is based on four pillars of infrastructure:

1. Partnerships and collaborations: Creating opportunities and driving effective joint working by building networks of local organisations and strategic partners;
2. Leadership and advocacy: Mobilising and encouraging community action, strengthening the sector’s voice and influence on key decision makers and funders;
3. Capacity building: Providing practical support, expertise and development for local people and organisations, to nurture skills and build community resilience; and
4. Volunteering: Building an environment in which volunteers and their communities thrive, by encouraging and nurturing volunteering opportunities.

It is part of Volunteer Essex, which brings together 1,700 organisations and 8,515 different roles. Essex is 31st of the 83 counties in the UK for volunteering. Assuming all volunteers were paid the minimum hourly rate, the work done by UK volunteers would be worth £18,700,000 per annum, over four times the amount donated to charity each year.

Volunteers come from all walks of life. Although asylum seekers are not allowed to seek paid work, they can volunteer, enabling them to gain experience and build up their CVs.

Evidence suggests there are many personal benefits, including physical well-being. Chelmsford CVS can put volunteers in touch with charities and other local bodies seeking to fill a wide variety of volunteer roles, including board members, event stewards and minibus drivers.

Rotary Young Musician District Final

Report by Anne Moriaty

The District Final took place in Brentwood Cathedral on Saturday 28 February in the presence of the Deputy Mayor of Chelmsford, Cllr Smita Rajesh, and her consort.

The audience were treated to a lovely concert with high standard performances from five vocalists and six instrumentalists. Sadly there could only be two winners going through to the Regional Final and after lengthy deliberations the accolades went to pianist Tailin Liu sponsored by the Rotary Club of Bishops Stortford and vocalist Harry Sunderland sponsored by the Rotary Club of Dunmow.

Our Chelmsford winners, Henrietta Lawrence and Chloe Mahler were worthy runners-up.

I had the honour of giving out the certificates and the Deputy Mayoress presented the winner and runner-up trophies.

Collection for Marie Curie

On 25 February 2026 President Graham, Francis Whitbread, Keith Dabbs, Anne Moriety and Steve, worked as a team at Morrisons Supermarket to collect monies on behalf of the Marie Curie charity. We collected a handsome sum, of which £80 was collected via card payment through the “SumUp” device. We enjoyed the day and special thanks to Francis who made the arrangements and remained all day throughout others’ slots. A photo opportunity could not go amiss.