I completely agree with Michael's comments.

And must state again that if anyone has concerns about the community library in anyway then please do contact us or your local Councillors.

We have both made all our contact details public & I'm on Dartmouth Rd 6 days a week if anyone wants to speak to me.

Both Michael & myself fought to the end to keep our library council run, but when the decision was made by Mayor and Cabinet for it to become a community library we decided to put in a bid as a not for profit organisation to keep our library a library.

We know it's not an easy task & welcome suggestions to make it even better, but as Michael said I'm also very proud of the library & the massive support we've had from the community, so thank you to all that have gave input and/or supported us in anyway. We couldn't do this without the community getting involved and working with us on this.

It goes something like this, this forum SE23.com is the Original forum of SE23, the other forum was set up by some local traders and other interested people because they disagreed with the way this forum was run/moderated. They didn't like that so went off and took their ball away with them because if they couldn't play, no one could.

As you have rightly said that causes some confusion about which is the actual forum for SE23.

The council decided to remove the funding from running the local library, so some of the local traders who had also set up the other forum plus the Forest Hill Society (think that's what they call themselves) plus others including V22 (still can't workout what they actually do or why they were involved) put in a bid to run the local library and surprise,surprise the council awarded them the contract to run the library.

There appears to be no publicity about how it is run, when meetings are held etc. and thus appears to be a bit of a closed shop unless you are part of them. They won the bid and now run the library as a community library.

Think that sums up the story of why the other forum came into existence and who now runs the library.

This post was last modified: 11-05-2017 09:12 PM by samuelsen.

The library is run primarily by volunteers from the local community, with one manager who is paid. The management committee consists of a few local people plus representatives of V22 (the arts organisation based in Dalston that manage Artists studios in Louise House and a number of other locations across London).

As well as a management group we intend to set up a stakeholders group (Advisory Board) from the local community to help set the strategic direction of the library and hold us to account (as well as being accountable to the council and local councillors and to the ward assembly). I admit we have been a bit slow at setting up the advisory board - our focus has been on getting the library systems working, ensuring all activities that took place in the library continued, that there was heating in the winter, that the library was actually open, our volunteers trained up, and that the finances of the library are secure.

I have reported on behalf of the library at a number of ward assemblies which are open to the public. Simon and Tara (manager of the library and director of V22) both attended the Forest Hill Society AGM (a public meeting) shortly after the library was opened.

Every week in the library members of the public thank the volunteers who are keeping the library running. Users of the library value the work that we are doing and I know that in the coming years we are going to do even better at running a really good community library.

If anybody wants to suggest new activities or improvements that we should be making to the library please do let me know and we will see what we can do.

Samuelsen, I am interested in who from the local traders set up the other site. Can you enlighten us? And lets be clear, I am a moderator on the other site and I am surprised by this as I didn't realise the other person was a local trader and he set up the forum. So, in an attempt for some clarity please point out to the rest of SE23.COM who these traders are.

Finally, as Michael has been at pains to point out, V22 and the Library are completely open to scrutiny. Why are you at pains to say they are not. I find it odd that a local resident can be so against a local amenity run by locals????

I'm probably missing something re the Library. I understand some of the comments re some of the participants, but the library I find odd. I'm not even sure how you make a library political, and from the times I have been in have seen no evidence of it.

I don't use it much, but periodically go in with the kids after they have been swimming - I'm really not sure what the issue is.

For me it is one of the great things, keeping it open, staffed mainly by volunteers - I'm not sure what's not to like.

Whilst I realise P1971 is not the most popular on here amongst some users, she was a clear driving force behind raising funding for this with Michael and other key players (I was not involved for clarity) and they should be thanked for this - I truly find this antagonism to the library strange and clearly am missing something.

Thanks for the clarification Appletree.

Londonrz - Original as in first, before any other.

Your forum has tried to call itself the forum of SE23 when it is NOT, it is anything but, and as I said in my previous post the only reason it was set up was because some people did not like the way moderation was conducted on this forum, so you people took your ball with you to play elsewhere. Now you're coming back on here and to be honest I do not see why. You didn't like it here, well go play in your own forum.

re: the library because if you do post elsewhere, why do you not post on here about the library and its management and as Michael has explained the establishment of a "stakeholders group (Advisory Board) from the local community to help set the strategic direction of the library" has yet to be established." Nothing wrong with that, at least Michael is being open.

Rather than becoming so defensive this was your opportunity to be much more open about the management of the library, the publishing of frequency of meetings, minutes, key major decisions taken by the management group etc.

samuelsen,

Londonrz is also nothing to do with the management of the library and does not speak on behalf of the library. As you have said, I've been quite open about the way we operate - I'm glad that Londonrz is not attempting to answer these questions. If you have other questions I'm happy to answer them in public or in private, to the best of my ability.

Michael, thank you for dealing with this so quickly,

Londonrz - Original as in first, before any other.

Yes SE23.com was first, it doesnt make it the only local site.

[color=#000000]Your forum has tried to call itself the forum of SE23 when it is NOT, it is anything but, and as I said in my previous post the only reason it was set up was because some people did not like the way moderation was conducted on this forum, so you people took your ball with you to play elsewhere. Now you're coming back on here and to be honest I do not see why. You didn't like it here, well go play in your own forum.

First things first, it is not my site, I dont own it or any share of it, I moderate on it unpaid as a volunteer as do others. As for coming back, I never left. I still post on here so please dont tell me which forum I can "play in".

re: the library because if you do post elsewhere, why do you not post on here about the library and its management and as Michael has explained the establishment of a "stakeholders group (Advisory Board) from the local community to help set the strategic direction of the library" has yet to be established." Nothing wrong with that, at least Michael is being open.

Re the library, I dont post anything that may be official to the Library, Louise House, V22, Horniman etc as I am not a representative of them, I use them as do countless others. If those who represent choose to post on here it is up to them, they can post wherever they like. I suggest you look through this site and you will see many many posts about local matters. It is afterall "The Official Community Forum"!

Rather than becoming so defensive this was your opportunity to be much more open about the management of the library, the publishing of frequency of meetings, minutes, key major decisions taken by the management group etc.

Again, please see my above answer, I do not represent the library, I am merely a poster on here and a mod on the other site. And again, most announcements are made here by the likes of the Forest Hill Society etc.

I hope this add's some clarity.[/color]

This post was last modified: 12-05-2017 03:34 PM by Londondrz.

samuelsen,

Londonrz is also nothing to do with the management of the library and does not speak on behalf of the library. As you have said, I've been quite open about the way we operate - I'm glad that Londonrz is not attempting to answer these questions. If you have other questions I'm happy to answer them in public or in private, to the best of my ability.

Thank you Michael, I hope my last post made that clear as well.

No it does not make it the only forum in SE23, BUT IT is THE Original SE23 forum, which to be honest, the one you volunteer as a moderator on is NOT.

But seriously does that not mean you have a conflict of interests by being on here as well, if you moderate there, and should you even be posting on here because of the conflict of interests ???????

you're not the only one who can write in colour!!!!!!

I was attempting to write in colour to clearly show my responses but the forum software does not make it easy. Hey ho.

I dont think anyone is claiming the other site is the original SE23 site, as you yourself said, the other person left here to set up another site, that kinda sets a time order to things.

Now, clearly explain why I cannot be a member of both forums and a moderator on one. This site does not have moderators.

If they were official sites or business in competition then there just MAY be a conflict. Neither are.

I am also a member of two different motorcycle forums, neither forum has told me I cant be a member of either.

Should mods on the other site leave the Sydenham forum or an Honor Oak forum or stop following local business on Twitter, or Instagram or any of the other many many forms of social media?

I am trying hard to understand your point of view but failing.

From memory I have been on here from around 2003/4, I really cant remember. Do I give that all up because you dont like it?

Edit: Since 2006. Sorry

This post was last modified: 12-05-2017 04:48 PM by Londondrz.

I find all this animosity bizarre. I have no stake in either place; I just want to know what's going on in the area. The best local forum is East Dulwich, for the same reason. But I don't live there.

People are allowed to belong to several forums as far as I know.

We have been very public who we are re the library, please see this link for more info.

http://www.foresthillsociety.com/2016/10...brary.html

Samuelsen we have met & I thought you were a lovely guy & appreciated your views. I still do & happy to have more chats with you anytime.

Hope you have a lovely evening.

Michael,
Yes it is sad that I'd rather the library was closed but at least there would have been a chance that it could be reopened, as was, at a later date. You presumably have a long lease.

You have continued to post here Michael. To spell it out it was P1971's vanishing act from this forum the very moment your library bid was won which indicated that this was no victory for anyone local. She did not even have the good manners to announce to locals that she had won after spending months using this site to campaign.

By the way, that is not a call out for P1971 to start regularly posting here again - her alliance is obviously with the FH Trader's site, and I'm just going to have to come to terms with that loss.

Yes, I got fully taken in by that poster as their 1st post was quite interesting. I finally concluded it was our clever old foxy friend in disguise and disengaged with the racist troll. I assume others came to same conclusion a little quicker. But there is nothing to suggest these are the views of the site owner here. I'm not sure you can say the same about SE23's other favourite site.

As I understand, 3 FH Traders execs went out of their way to help fund and setup a site with a person of openly extreme views. Either they all agreed with the views or they were not bothered if this new site was used to promote them. They then won the bid on running the library. Do you really see no problem? A library isn't just a shop.

will be delighted the volunteers have saved them £100k+ pa - you have nothing to fear from them.

Then why would they want to be on the boards then?

And some more thoughts....

To be fair, the traders have good reason for wanting the library open in some form to encourage footfall to the road. They are not necessarily there to poison the well. They just happen to be openly good mates with a famous poisoner. That's all right then.

More generally I believe the model of funding our libraries, schools, hospitals, etc by local benefactors as the state shrinks is a thoroughly bad one.
They will not provide the same level of funding - why should they - 'you're lucky to get anything at all', and it is open to abuse - 'its our money and if we want x,y or z promoted instead of a,b.c then that's what is going to happen.' This is the thin edge of the wedge and it really turns my stomach.

Hi Perryman, the only reason I stopped posting here was because I got banned from posting (don't know why, I wasn't told).

I have never funded the other site & to my knowledge no other FHTA exec members have either. I post on there regularly & verify peeps but am not involved in any other way.

Regarding the library, I'm quite sad & sorry how you feel about this. We fought to the end to keep it council run, but when the decision was made for it to become a community library we decided to put in a bid ourselves (see ourselves in my previous post) so we could keep it a library.

If you can convince the council to re-staff Forest Hill library then I'm sure we could come to some arrangement. But my motivation was to prevent our well used library end up as a set of book cases with a security guard, open for a few hours per week (as happened in other libraries). I was not prepared to see it closed, and there were no other organisations that were prepared to keep it open. Had a better bid come along I would have supported that!

I am here to defend the library. P1971 had more problems than me, as did a number of businesses who were not allowed to defend themselves, and other posters from across the political spectrum. I don't really want to get involved in the forum wars, but I know when I'm not wanted.

I disagree. I think if you look at the previous posts of that nasty racist they went to FH Comprehensive School, not Southend Grammar. But when I see racists or offensive posts I try to explain to people why they are wrong rather than boycotting the site altogether. But I agree that the other person's posts do a disservice to the other site and turn people off using that forum (which is what started this thread by a poster who has apparently never previously felt the desire to post on either forums). I'm not here to defend one forum or another, I only got involved in this to defend the library becoming collateral damage through misinformation/insinuation on this thread. You might not care if your comments damage the library, but I do.

I think that was a previous forum that fell flat on it's face due to poor layout, lack of engagement, lack of commitment by the people who set it up, and some deliberate attacks on the site.

Because they care and want to make a difference. For some people this is a motivation more important than political advantage or personal financial gain. Governors of schools and volunteers in the library are the types of people who make Forest Hill a better place.