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Community shares, wellbeing, fan power and an Antarctic expedition

Welcome to the first edition of Doing Things Different, the FC United blog, where you’ll be able to read a regular update on what we’ve been up to as a club, news of interesting meetings, new developments and initiatives - and much more.

The last couple of weeks have seen a great deal of activity as we crack on with the work needed to get us to our new ground in Moston. We still have around 50 people left to sign over their shares from Ten Acres Lane, amounting to around £20,000, but the money is coming in. Our volunteers are working hard phoning round and they’ve had some interesting conversations as they track down members who are yet to sign over. On calling one member we were told that he was at the hospital with his wife who had gone into labour. A pretty good excuse for not sending off the form you might think, but possibly trumped by the member who can’t sign over yet because they are away on an expedition in Antarctica.

Elsewhere, our Wellbeing Project in Newton Heath continues to receive good feedback; described as "a Godsend" by local area health workers. FC volunteers and community staff have been visiting residents under this good neighbour scheme and some strong links have already been established. Whilst the location of the ground development may have moved up the road to Moston we have maintained our promise to assist community groups in Newton Heath. We’ve also been involved in discussions with the Manchester Rugby League Strategy Group to talk about RL development in Manchester and how that fits with the new facility in Moston. If you follow rugby league and would like to be kept informed of developments then email rugbyleague@fc-utd.co.uk

Last week, FC board member Phil Sheeran attended the Supporters Direct (SD) lobby of Parliament on football licensing whilst FC board member Jules Spencer and I, plus a number of other FC members, attended the Football Supporters Federation (FSF) North West regional meeting in Altrincham. FC is affiliated to both SD and the FSF, and as a fan-owned club it is important that we support wider supporter-led initiatives as well as those that directly affect us. Last week also saw us meet up with the manager of Moston Sure Start to discuss ways of working together; one of the first initiatives will be a training workshop for local residents and groups on fundraising and access to grants. This is a difficult time for fundraising, FC United has a lot of experience in this field and the workshop aims to help local groups become more sustainable by accessing funds for their own activities.

A busy week included a meeting with our internal project team to discuss a series of planned consultation events with FC members about the new ground at Moston. We’ll be posting full details of all of these events on our website very shortly including updates from the project team on the latest state of play.

We have been out and about spreading the word about FC United at a couple of events just recently too. I addressed a delegation from Sweden about FC United. The meeting was held at the Manchester Digital Development Agency and the delegation was keen to learn more about how we organise, our community work and stadium plans. International audiences like this are important as they help us spread the message about fan ownership and its benefits.

Speaking of audiences, I was also invited to speak at a seminar organised by All About Audiences, the audience development agency for the North West that works with arts, heritage and cultural organisations to help better understand and grow audiences. I spoke about the importance of our ownership model; how we work with supporters and members at FC United and how they are central to everything that we do. There was a lot of interest in our approach and we made some useful contacts for the future.

We also found time last week to meet Manchester College to explore training opportunities for volunteers and young people. We have an excellent relationship with the college and working in partnership like this will bring big benefits for both organisations.

If you have any comments or questions about Doing Things Different, or want to suggest something we should be talking about, please get in touch at FCblog@fc-utd.co.uk


First Posted ~ 22:36 Tue 7 Feb 2012
News ID ~ 4043
Last Updated ~ 02:08 Tue 16 Feb 2021