WECH is a resident-controlled Community Land Trust in the Harrow Road ward of North Westminster.
WECH is membership-based organisation, with every tenant and leaseholder being entitled to join. WECH currently has 628 members. The Annual General Meeting often attracts over a hundred residents, to elect the board members. Elections are frequently contested, which helps to ensure that those elected are genuinely representative and accountable. All board members are supported with training sessions and an annual awayday.
WECH has a Community Centre and Watson Gardens, with a multi-purpose sports pitch. The resident involvement of WECH is encouraged by the social and community activities taking place at WECH.
Resident control at WECH is boosted by this programme of social and community activities, helping to build a community in which residents, board members and staff work together. The activities aim to involve residents of all ages and backgrounds, aiming to deliver a range of activities to respond to residents’ priority needs and engage a range of ages, cultures and interests.
Community Land Trust
WECH is a Community Benefit Society. Our constitution satisfies the legal definition for being a Community Land Trust as legislated in the Housing & Regeneration Act 2008, Part 2, Chapter 1, Clause 79:
A Community Land Trust is a corporate body which:
1) is established for the express purpose of furthering the social, economic and environmental interests of a local community by acquiring and managing land and other assets in order –
- to provide benefit to the local community
- to ensure that the assets are not sold or developed except in a manner which the trust’s members think benefits the local community
2) is established under arrangements which are expressly designed to ensure that:
- any profits from its activities will be used to benefit the local community (otherwise than by being paid directly to members)
- individuals who live or work in the specified area have the opportunity to become members of the trust (whether or not others can also become members)
- the members of a trust control it.