Last night at the Faversham Society AGM attended by just short of 100 people Harold Goodwin was elected Chair of the Society for 2016-17

I accept the responsibility with a suitable degree of trepidation.

Within 24 hours of discovering Faversham in October 1976 I had resolved to make it my home, Jack Harris had taken me to The Sun, introduced me as a friend and asked that I be treated as a local. I understand and appreciate that those of us for whom Faversham is our adopted home can never be truly local – we weren’t born or schooled here.

I have now  lived here for nearly 40 years and treasure all the things that make Faversham special and, I would argue, unique – the town and port, the marshes and the creek, its spirit and its history. I have been employed across East Kent, in London, Greenwich, Leeds and Manchester – but I have lived here continuously in the same square half mile in the heart of Faversham and always worked from here.

When I ran an adult education programme here I met Arthur Percival though Dorothy and along with others I encouraged him to teach – I regret that none of us thought to video his lectures. We forgot that heritage needs to be conserved. Dorothy recently shared with me one of Arthur’s drafts of our motto: “Sense the presence of the past, share the warmth of the present, savour the promise of the future." Indeed, the warmth of the present and the promise of future…..

I joined the Faversham Society Board two years ago, urged by Arthur to do so. For forty years I have enjoyed so many things that are special about Faversham, we owe many of them to those who founded the Society and fought for our heritage. I felt that it was time for me to contribute to the Society rather than to take for granted the work of others. Over the last two years, under Michael’s leadership, the structure and procedures of the Society have been much reformed and the Environment Committee has been established and begun its work.

Our new Mayor has initiated the Faversham Future Forum, the “ 20’s Plenty” campaign is making headway, Bearing Fruits is being consulted on this summer and the referendum on the Faversham Creek Neighbourhood Plan will be held in the autumn. The Society needs to be actively engaged across these agendas and the Board needs to engage with its members to determine and promulgate our collective view. The Society’s view is never likely to accord entirely with the views of any one member or trustee. I shall always be careful to distinguish between my view and that of the Society – I shall expect other trustees to do the same.

I have talked with many of the volunteers about engaging people in Faversham and the surrounding villages about what we want to conserve for our children and grandchildren – and we should ask the children too what they value about their home town. In the autumn we are organising, jointly with St Mary of Charity, a public lecture about the important wall paintings currently behind the organ (October 4^th) and a members evening with James Freeman and Simon Algar to discuss what our planners can do to assist with the conservation of our heritage. (September 14^th)

I look forward to my time as Chair of one of Faversham’s most important institutions.

You can find out more about Harold Goodwin at www.haroldgoodwin.info