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community and fan ownership of Accrington Stanley

Colleagues, Friends,

With the new season well and truly underway I wanted to use this bulletin board as a way to invite fans and members of the broader community to a meeting in Accrington that I hope to set up in early September with the express purpose of advancing the concept of community and fan ownership of ASFC.

This is a direct follow up to my commitment, made earlier in the summer, during the bulletin board conversation about ground and infrastructure development. At that time I promised to get back with more detail and more momentum that I felt could benefit the town and the club, and I also promised at that time to try and be as inclusive as possible in these conversations so that anyone who felt they wished to contribute could do so.

By way of introduction I would make the following points:

1. One of the reasons for this message is that I hope we can set up a time that maximises the attendance of as many people as possible. In the past we have set up meetings, and then informed people, only to find large numbers unable to attend. Hopefully the use of this wonderful bulletin board will allow people to come back to me (PM me or direct response on the board) with suggestions on when and where we hold the meeting.

2. Its important to have an inclusive and transparent agenda. I hope that through this bulletin board we can come up with suggestions for agenda items that then mean our final agenda will be meaningful and will benefit from input from a wide variety of people.

3. I hope to invite the club's auditors, Pierce, to attend. If we are to be serious in our hope of creating a long term sustainable club that works with and for the community, then it will take professional structuring.

4. The ownership of the club is very different from management. I would like to request that we focus our meeting on the subject of community and fan based ownership, and then also extend to governance (transparency, accountability, sustainability). Only thereafter can we credibly address the issue of long term management.

As you know, my view is that ASFC belongs to the community. With the events of the past few years behind us, I hope I am not wrong in hoping that we can blaze a new trail and who knows, even a new model. The club needs the support of the broadest widest constituency of people in this area. If we are to get better crowds and more sponsorship, then we must restructure from the top.

I close by highlighting the obvious. Its possible none of this will lead anywhere and we must manage our expectations, however each journey starts with a first step, and I hope you will agree that our club has now got to the stage where an issue of this magnitude and importance can be debated with a positive attitude and with as inclusive a participation as possible. It also helps that I have been able, in the past few months, to acquire a greater working knowledge of the dynamics of the club's operations as well as seeing how different models work overseas.

I do hope that the current management of the club in the form of Mr Heys and Mr O'Neil might come along as well, but this initiative is entirely personal to me, though benefitting, as you would expect, from conversations with lots of people.

More to come on this.

In the meantime can i request that we try and limit our conversation to this board and not by PM unless you absolutely feel you need to chat direct. as always my email address ilyas.khan and my mobile is 07826 600600. i will always try to answer calls and reply to emails. Be aware i am still in Asia till next weds.

Ilyas