Land buy-out group celebrates first anniversary
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An East Sutherland community group is celebrating the first anniversary of its £300,000 land buy-out.
Garbh Allt Community Initiative (GACI) took over the 3000-acre West Helmsdale crofting estate in June last year from Sutherland Estates.
Director Audrey Munro said: “The past 12 months has seen GACI create jobs, begin work on a unique archive and attract members from all over the world.”
The group’s current development officer Jonathan Langlois, who moved north from Glasgow with his wife and two small children to take up the post, is working on long-term plans for deer management, woodland and developing the moorland, in ways compatible with crofting.
He said: “The area has great potential and by working with other organisations we can really make a difference and put this place firmly on the map. There won’t be a transformation overnight but we are developing a range of projects to create long-term, sustainable jobs, including capitalising on increased tourism from NC500.”
Work is also ongoing to digitalise nine boxes of paper records relating to the estate and handed over by Sutherland Estates after the sale.
“We have a gold mine of information ranging from single page letters to hand-written croft records,” said Ms Munro.
“I found the hand-written fair rent application of my great-grand-father Donald Watson, one of the four founders of the Helmsdale Land League, saying any improvements had been carried out by himself or his predecessors.
“Another director Esther MacDonald found the will of her great-aunt, leaving the croft to her father, former Sutherland councillor, J O F Mackay. The same aunt had been on the 1918 Portgower Land Raid and had taken her four-year-old nephew with her.”
GACI, which has an office at Timespan Visitors Centre, Helmsdale, is set to launch a membership drive – ordinary membership is limited to those who live on the estate, but associate membership is open to everyone.
Ms Munro said: “The buy-out was the focus of attention across the world because of the area’s Clearances and Land League history. As a result GACI township descendants, living as far afield as Toronto and Vancouver have signed up as members.”
The group plans to create another job later in the year to support the development officer and undertake office administration.
GACI chairwoman Anne Fraser said: “It’s been a fantastic and hectic year. GACI is all about reviving the wider community, not just the crofting townships, and we hope that some of our ventures will start to bear fruit in the next year.”
