TOWN AWARDS NIGHT

 

 

 

Most people think that Santa’s  “little helpers” are the elves and dwarves who live at the North Pole but the town councillors of Pembroke Dock had inside knowledge that one little helper  is living in Pembroke Dock and has been doing his good turn for the local children each festive season for the last twenty one years.  So  this Christmas they decided it was time to recognise his efforts with  some town council mementoes  on behalf of the people of the town.

Paul George was one of six people invited to the council chambers and the other five were all nominated by  local people for the  Pembroke Dock Council Community awards which recognise public spirited work and charity volunteering.  Those five received certificates and town council mementoes at a special evening in the Council Chambers in December.

Every good organisation needs it’s behind the scenes grafters and the success of the Sunderland Trust in creating their museum records and displays, generating a large number of visitors to Pembroke Dock, is down to a strong team effort.  Two members of that team are Alan Ross and Mike Hurley who were nominated as having done a huge amount of hours of behind the scenes work in the archives section – the backbone of any such museum group.

Two similar hard workers  from another voluntary organisation were also nominated, as Yvonne Earl and Beryl Wright have contributed so much towards the Encompass Group, which has charity work and all kinds of Community Training as two of it’s core aims.

Those Four awards were the Commendation awards and  all were extremely deserving, but the council reserves a special Award Of Merit for exceptional levels of community work and this year it was presented to Mr Ron Watts.  He is currently  Chairman of the Museum Trust and a keen observer of everything that is going on in Pembroke Dock – but he will readily admit that he does less now than he used to.  However his “ reduced work” is still a great deal and it was not so long ago that he was an industrious  town councillor and also past Mayor and also helped start up the current Pater Hall Community Trust of which he was chairman for the first few years.  An ex military man and keen historian, he has completed a history of all the army regiments stationed at Pembroke Dock and also put together his own potted history of the town – focussing mainly on the Central ward which he used to represent as a councillor.  These fascinating and information packed articles can be seen on the history and Military History sections of the Pembroke Dock web site.  They are well worth checking out.

 

Left to right are: Alan Ross, Yvonne Earl, Beryl Wright, Mayor Cllr Andrew McNaughton, Ron Watts, Mike Hurley and Paul George