Support with managing your community venue

We provide practical guidance and advocacy to trustees, employees and management committees of community buildings across rural North, South and West Yorkshire.

You can access support on a range of areas including: good governance; safeguarding; finance and funding; policies and procedures and operational good practice. We facilitate a regular support network for people managing community venues and host a closed Facebook peer support group.

Upcoming Network meetings

Share your experience of running rural community buildings, learn about new resources and policy development, and explore mutual topics of interest. In these inclusive network meetings, members set the agenda. Open to all people managing community run venues.

Previous network meetings

An overview of previous network meeting discussions, useful links and resources.

November 2024: Managing fire risk in village halls

May 2024: The Truth about Committee: Roles and Responsibilities

February 2024: Go Green Village Halls Week and funding update

Here is a link to the two presentations on funding and energy savings given at the meeting, plus some other supporting documentation:

Previous meetings

October 2023: Digital connectivity for your community building

July 2023: Diversifying your community building

Useful links

Food hygiene requirements:

Energy Saving and Bill Support:

Community Engagement:

Other links:

May 2023: Decarbonisation and energy saving

November 2022: Hire agreements

August 2022: online booking systems

May 2022: Planning significant refurbishment, extension or new builds for your hall

February 2022: Dementia friendly halls and asset registers

January 2022: Village Halls Week. Meet your community buildings advisors; an introduction to Community First Yorkshire and how we can support you and your hall.

Facebook Peer Support Group

We have a closed Facebook group for committee members of community buildings and village halls. We now have over 400 members from across Yorkshire who regularly post questions and answers, and support each other.

The group is for all those involved with running community buildings as a space to share their thoughts, actions and questions on all aspects of hall management. You will need a Facebook account to join, please contact us if you need help with this. If you already have a Facebook account please click here to join.

Specialist resources

Because we are the ACRE Network member for North, South and West Yorkshire, our members are able to access specialist ACRE resources written exclusively for community buildings and village halls. These information sheets and model documents will guide you with every aspect of running a village hall, from insurance and creating a business plan to hiring agreements and trust deeds.

Find out how to become a Community First Yorkshire member to access these resources.

General resources

We have a wide range of general information available to all organisations, which includes good governance; finance and funding; policies and procedures and operational good practice.

Useful links

We are the Action with Communities in Rural England (ACRE) Village Hall Adviser for community buildings in rural North, South and West Yorkshire. To find out more about the work of ACRE and how they support Village Halls and Rural communities visit Action for Communities in Rural England.

Contact us

To find out more about the network please contact the team at communitysupport@communityfirstyorkshire.org.uk or by calling 01904 704177.