Helston Community to Play a Greater Role in Museum's Future

People of Helston are to be given a greater say in how Helston Folk Museum should be run in the future. Earlier this year it was revealed that while Cornwall Council still have funding in place to run it for this year, there was no plan in place for what would happen after that. Meetings between possible local stakeholders have been held to look at potential future options for the museum beyond 2012. To help decide on the next step a public meeting has now been scheduled for 7pm on Thursday 3rd November at the Methodist Hall in Helston.

Cornwall Council Cabinet support member for Culture and Leisure, Joan Symons says: "We are looking at a number of options which includes the community forming a new organisation to manage the Museum; the Town Council managing the Museum or Cornwall Council commissioning an organisation to manage it. With any business model proposed, there are pros and cons, which is why the group that met decided that a meeting with the local community to explore these options in detail is needed."

The group identified that volunteers from within the local community who feel passionately about Helston Museum need to come forward to help make things happen, and it was agreed that a meeting would be arranged for people to put their views forward and also offer support to the Museum to help it develop and reach new audiences.

Cornwall Council member for Helston Central, Judith Haycock said: "We are asking local residents to get more involved in helping with the development of the Museum, whether they wish to volunteer to help the day to day running of the Museum or feel they have business skills to offer a new organisation. I would like to state, yet again, that Cornwall Council has no intention of closing the Museum."