Here We Are community takes next step into the future
Decades of environmental entrepreneurship have reaped substantial rewards for a Mid Argyll community, and now they are ready to take this one step further.
The Cairndow community’s share in the Merk hydro scheme, and the profits made each year from its own biomass company, have contributed to a vast range of initiatives, including a new home-care service and a community centre.
Known as Our Hydro and Our Power the local energy schemes pay the wages of 11 members of staff and provide the money behind the Here We Are community fund.
Money from its energy companies has helped the Cairndow community buy 37 hectares of woodland at Ballure and create a path round the head of the loch from the village to Glen Fyne and Clachan.
It also finances events like the Hogmanay ceilidh and exhibitions about the pioneering renewable energy schemes in venues throughout Scotland.
A spokesperson for Here We Are explained: “In 1998 to find funds to set up Here We Are wasn’t easy. The concept was imaginative, innovative, unproven. Now 24 years later we can show the funders who took a risk to back us in 2000 that we made good use of the risk they took.”
The cash has helped create a comprehensive social history archive and website, oral recordings and thousands of documented photographs of local life from 1900 onwards.
The renewable energy funds also meant that the community could offer a deposit on a three-bedroomed house to be used by a local carer and their family. The purchase of the house was then secured with assistance from the NatWest Social and Community Capital fund.
The spokesperson added: “Now our latest challenge is to facilitate a carer who would live and work within the community. The shortage of carers and the increasing number of people in need of care, is well known, particularly in rural areas with long distances to be travelled.
“So, we are now looking out for a self-employed carer or personal assistant to whom we would offer No 1 Kilmorich, Cairndow at a subsidised rate."
The house at Kilmorich will be home to the successful candidate in a recruitment process that begins this week.
The three-bedroomed house will be offered at a reduced rent to the care worker.
Applicants interested in caring for the local community in Cairndow should send a CV and covering letter to mail@hereweare-uk.com.
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