Newlarks Residents Association

Newlarks Residents Association was set up September 1994 to help build a partnership between Orwell Housing Association (OHA) and their tenants.  We strongly believe prompting tenants participation to take an active interest in Orwell’s work and committees makes for a much better relationship between landlord and tenant.

We may not have many members on our committee but we are a strong group and very proactive in achieving another of our aims of setting up the residents association, which is improving and assisting our little community the best we can.  To do this we hold regular committee meetings on the last Wednesday of the month (excluding December).  Although our meeting in March is our AGM/social evening and this is open to all the residents of Newlarks and people who have helped us throughout the year. 

Since the committee has been formed we have been hands-on in various improvements which have been made throughout the estates of St Catherines and Newnham Court and Woodlark Close; car park security lighting, replacing of prickly bushes to a more child (and bike tyre !) friendly variety, landscaping and tending of the communal gardens, to mention but a few.

Below is a snippet of what we are doing at the present time but please go to their respective pages for more details.

For being a recognised residents association, OHA award us with an annual Amenity Fund of £1,250.  Which we can spend on anything that is considered an improvement to the estate or to making our residents lives easier/safer or better. 

We are currently in the process of tackling a persistent problem of flooding, and in the past we have successfully worked with the Council to replace a once cobbled area into a much more practical and safe pathway in and out of the estate and more recently improving our streetlights.  Go to ‘BIG Estate Improvements’ page.

Recently we completed phase 1 of a new play area on a piece of waste ground in-between Vinnicombe Court and St Catherines Court, for more on this please go to the 'play area development' page and for the projects step by step developments over the last few months to the present day see 'Kate's play area blog'.   Our massive thanks go to Suffolk ACRE and Councillor Rawlingson as the majority funders to make this project possible. 

During the school holidays we hold a very well attended holiday club twice a week for the children of the 3 estates, of which we hope will continue again this summer. 

Thank you for taking the time to read our site and I hope you come back soon!

Many thanks ~ Kate, Secretary for Newlarks.