Chairman Chat

PBA Annual General Meeting

As so many of you have approached me about the continued uncertainty surrounding the PBA Sports & Social Club and how it affects the us, the youth football club, I thought it was only right to update you with the current situation before the new year and my January monthly post.

No doubt some of you will already be aware, but the Chairman, Treasurer and all the trustees have decided to step down from their positions.  What this means is any PBA members between 2019-20 can attend the AGM to exercise their constitutional right to vote (13th January, 20.15 pm), including parents who were members in the last 6 months of 2019.

We paid the PBA Sports & Social Club in January 2020 for 230 family memberships, so parents could use the facilities between June 1st 2019 - December 31st 2019 as members, before their introduction of their new 2020 membership and two tier pricing of bar products came into play. This was changed from the original 12 month membership, but parents from the football section were still allowed to use the facilities.

• The initial agreement was half of your £20.00 football signing on fee was to be paid to the PBA Sports & Social Club for a 12 month family membership.
• This was changed by the PBA to 6 months (June 19-Dec 19), with an additional £2.50 added to £12.50, so it comparative to the full payment of £25.00 other PBA members made. New renewals then started in January 2020 with the introduction of a new two tier price list.

The PBA Sports and Social Club have been in long discussions with Bristol City Council to take over the site and in turn have seemed to be reluctant to give the football club the security we required while these talks have been ongoing. For me, this further uncertainty isn't great, as we have been waiting for the 'next announcement', to give us this security which now isn't going to come anytime soon. We have always tried to work with the PBA Sports & Social Club to ensure this is a home for the local children in the area that play football. The relationship has been strained over the years but had recently improved during Covid-19 where football club numbers were using the PBA were high and probably showed our worth as other members were not attending as frequent.

It is a big step for the PBA Sports & Social Club and one I believe you should be apart of. If we as a club recieve any further correspondence from the PBA I will inform you all. 

Chris