At the last meeting of the Rotary Club of Bolsover President Rita Reed welcomed members and guests to her first meeting as President of the club. She went on to say it was an honour to be a Rotarian in a club that has done so much in the community it represents and that she aims to continue with this work and develop new initiatives.
The speakers for the evening were Jane Woodward and Barbara White from the local Time Bank Charity. They explained that Time Banking enables people to offer their time skills and experience to others, and in equal measure receive help from them.
Members of a Time Bank accrue time credits when they give their time to another member of the Time Bank and for every hour of time a member gives by providing a service to another member, they receive an hour’s time credit, in return. They can then exchange this credit for any other member’s time. Time Banks have the greatest positive impact on people / communities that have weak social networks i.e. don’t know their neighbours or have few or no family around. It is also a powerful model in less affluent communities and a new tool to complement existing community development work.
Following many questions on the working and applicability of such a scheme Rotarian Geoff Davis offered a warm vote of thanks to the presenters and said he was impressed by the presentation and professionalism of the presenters and looked forward to the two organisations being able to compliment each others work.