Hopes and plans for the New Year

Terry Gore manages homelessness charity Catching Lives, a self-funding day centre in Canterbury's Station Road East. The service is running on empty and needs to find around £100,000 to fund each year. For more information on Catching Lives or to donate, visit www.catchinglives.org

What are your New Year's Resolutions?

Dropping four stone and giving up smoking.

What are you looking forward to in the New Year?

Working for Catching Lives and making sure we ensure we get the funding for this vital service for another year.

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Canterbury resident Ian McQuaibe, 25, was homeless for more than five years and now volunteers at Catching Lives and as a youth worker at Thanington Resource Centre.

What are your New Year's Resolutions?

To get a well-paid job and to give up smoking.

What are you looking forward to in the New Year?

It just being the New Year. I'll see how it goes. You never know what might happen in the future.

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Margaret Burns is chairman of Herne Bay in Bloom. Herne Bay was the overall winner of the coastal town category in the 2012 Britain In Bloom awards and a silver gilt medal winner in the competition.

What are your New Year's Resolutions?

To put more into the community. I was born in Herne Bay and I feel it's our duty to keep uplifting it for residents and visitors.

What are you looking forward to in the New Year?

Making Herne Bay even more beautiful. We're very involved in the Queen Elizabeth Coastal Park – the new gardens near the Kings Hall and the clock tower.

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Gerald McCarthy is the founder of the Bay Promo Team, which puts on Herne Bay events such as the Zombie Crawl, which raises money for Kent Air Ambulance.

What are your New Year's Resolutions?

To reach more people in Herne Bay so we become more of a hub. We want to bulk out the social calendar. We're trying our best with Halloweek, the Zombie Crawl and Christmas Ball.

What are you looking forward to in the New Year?

Putting on more events and promoting other people's. We're looking forward to a big sci-fi event in June with replica Daleks, a 45-foot marshmallow man and superheroes. We're also doing a Titanic-themed ball for the centenary celebrations of the Kings Hall.

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David Birch is chairman and trustee of Herne Bay Historical Records Society. He was born in the Bay, and his granddaughter was the 269th Holness to be baptised in Herne Church.

What are your New Year's Resolutions?

I'm 80 years old and I've never made a New Year's Resolution but I'd love to see my youngest granddaughter reach school age.

What are you looking forward to in the New Year?

I'd love to see the society, which is a registered charity, have its own income and premises so we have more control over what we own.

We've got a smashing little town, but I think we come third to Canterbury and Whitstable. I'd like to see the town's fortunes improve. We need someone who will push and shove and drive it forward.

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Whitstable artist Carl Stafford, 48, is giving away his paintings – all 100 of them. He hired Whitstable's Horsebridge Centre for an exhibition called Nothing's Free, in which the twist is that the paintings are free.

What are your New Year's Resolutions?

I don't generally make resolutions as they get broken on January 2.

What are you looking forward to in the New Year?

To becoming a multimillionaire. I get a lottery ticket every few weeks. To make a million from my art, I'll have to wait until I'm dead and gone.

HB Times 3rd Jan 2013

Derelict Methodist church in Herne Bay High Street is sold

A derelict Methodist church in Herne Bay High Street has been sold to be turned into flats after languishing on the market for the past two years. The historic landmark was opened in 1885 but the Methodists moved out ten years ago and the pigeons moved in.

The building, on the corner of the High Street and Beach Street, has planning permission for 11 flats on condition that the exterior remains untouched. Peter Goodwin, manager of estate agents Wilbee and Son, said all that was left was the facade.

The organ, which was first played in the church in 1896 was dismantled, catalogued and shipped to a European buyer. The pews were also sold off. Mr Goodwin said:

"It was in total disrepair. The pigeons had taken over and were living in the building rent-free. All we sold was the shell with planning permission. We gave it a clean-up and opened the windows, and the pigeons flew away. It is one of the longest sales we have had because of the planning issues. It is a huge development project and will cost about £1million."

The church was put on the market for £425,000 in 2010, but difficulties with potential buyers securing a mortgage on the property meant it had to be a cash buy. It was eventually sold last month to a London developer for around £300,000. The deal took months to complete while the new owners made sure all the paperwork was in place.

David Birch, chairman and trustee of Herne Bay Historical Records Society, remembers having lessons in the church during the Second World War. He said:

"From the air, schools could look like military bases, so we would register at the school in the morning and then take our lessons at various churches in the area. Eventually they built an air raid shelter around the corner from the school. I spent a lot of time sitting on the biscuit tin that contained our emergency food rations. At that time churches were busy for one day a week, Sunday, morning, noon and night, but were empty during the week so they were perfect for lessons."

The church closed ten years ago because of dwindling attendance. The congregation joined with the United Church in Mortimer Street. Maintenance on the empty building was costing the Methodists thousands of pounds a year until it was sold to Whitstable developer Paul Langston. Mr Birch said:

"It closed because of sheer lack of numbers. We wondered what was going to happen for a long time. I'd still like to know what they are going to do with the 100-ft stone spire. I wouldn't like to own a flat and be responsible for the maintenance of that roof. There's also a plot of land alongside the church. It will be interesting to see what happens to that."

Mr Langston owned the building for the past four years with the intention of developing it into flats but never proceeded with the project. There have since been about four offers on the building and he sold off the fixtures and fittings before it changed hands.

Evelyn Bissett, city councillor for Herne and Broomfield, said:

"It has been a long time coming. People can do marvellous things with churches now. I think it will help the town considerably."

Herne Bay Times