Press Archive

Six Villages Compete for County Title

Six villages are competing for the prestigious title of 2005 Devon Village of the Year. Initial assessment of the paper entries is currently taking place and Bittaford, Loxhore, Newton St. Cyres, Harbertonford, Yarcombe and Offwell are all waiting to hear which of them will be shortlisted to receive a visit from competition judges.

The Devon Village of the Year competition is run by the Community Council of Devon (CCD) with sponsorship provided by Calor, the UK’s leading supplier of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). The competition judges communities on six aspects of village life with categories in Building Community Life, Business, Young People, Older People, the Environment and Information Communication Technology (ICT).

Competition organiser on behalf of CCD, Rory Cunningham, commented: “We’ve had some good entries through so I think it’s going to be difficult to narrow them down for the judges’ visits. Whether they get through to the next round or not, all six villages have done very well and I would like to thank the communities for their hard work and commitment in putting together their entries.”

The winning villages will be announced in August and a presentation event will take place later in the year at CCD’s annual conference. An overall winner and runner up will be selected as well as a winner in the ICT section. Also, thanks to competition support from Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) this year, there is an extra £500 which will go to a number of successful villages in Devon’s Building Community Life section.

Following on from this competition, one village will have the opportunity to go forward and represent the county in the national English Calor Village of the Year^® competition, which this year has a prize fund of over £36,000 and a top prize of £6,000.

Rory Cunningham added: “Devon has produced an overall winner in the national competition as well as many category winners so I am confident that the village we select to compete will do well. It’s a great opportunity for one village to see how it can do against communities from pretty much every county in England and I am sure that any one of our six competitors for Devon’s title would put up a good fight!”

For further information on the Devon Village of the Year competition is available from Rory Cunningham at the Community Council of Devon by email at rory@devonrcc.org.uk, or by telephoning 01392 382535.

Further press information from: Emma Flinn, Flent PR Ltd
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