From left: Caterham Festival Chairman, Andy Parr with Best of Fest award winners Lorna Dommett, John Soffe (The Arc), Simon Edge, Peter Dommett and Chantal Baker.

On Tuesday 25th February the Caterham Festival AGM and awards presentation evening took place in the Soper Hall in Caterham Valley.

The Chairman of Tandridge District Council, Beverley Connolly, was Guest of Honour at the meeting which was packed with members of the Caterham Festival team and supporters. At the start of the proceedings, Beverley Connolly welcomed everyone to the meeting and commented on the good turnout which she said was indicative of the popularity of the event.

She added: “I am over the moon because I am going to be Chairman of Tandridge District Council until June which means that I will be opening the deFest Music Festival again for the second year running!

“I would like to congratulate Andy on a superb Festival last year. He is supported by a great team. You are a fantastically dedicated bunch of people.”

Andy Parr, Chairman of the Caterham Festival, announced that last year's Festival was the first Caterham Festival to make a profit. He said: “I am delighted that last year's Festival was so successful and profitable. So long as the Festival continues to make a profit we will be able to keep it going and run free events for everyone to enjoy. Out of over 130 events held last year, 70 of them were free to attend.

“We think about 24,000 people attended the Festival last year. The Street Party was wonderful and I would like to say a big thank you to Caterham Round Table for their donation towards the cost of running it. Open Caterham was very popular as well, giving people the chance to see interesting parts of Caterham that aren't normally open to the public, and the events put on at The Arc, including the Murder Mystery Evening, were brilliant.”

Andy then presented the Best of Fest awards to people who had made a special contribution to last year's Caterham Festival.

The winners were:

'Festival Food Hero' Chantal Baker;

'Festival Fund Raiser' Simon Edge;

'Festival Event that wasn't in the Festival'Floral Gallery;

'Festival Supporting Group' The Arc;

'Festival Trade supporter' Vivace Pianos;

'Festival New Event' Pete and Lorna Dommett for the Great Bake-Off.

Andy then launched the Caterham Festival 2014 before the close of the meeting and refreshments.