A SECOND meeting has taken place to co-ordinate ideas to make the millennium a memorable occasion for the people of Winsford.

Clr Nick Harris chaired the meeting and admitted the disappointment which the town council felt after the poor attendance at the first meeting in July.

He said: "We were disappointed with the turnout last time and felt we might have a problem getting groups involved."

Although more groups were present on Monday, the main concrete ideas at the moment are the plans for which a large-scale lottery grant is needed.

Two full applications have been approved for lottery funding, Vale Royal Borough Council's water festival and the Youth Forum's Winsford 2000 photographic exhibition.

The proposed £20,000 grant for the waterways would cover 60 per cent of the necessary funding of the scheme.

Vale Royal applications manager Andrea Peattie said: "The water festival is to provide an archive of waterways and will involve three mini-festivals in towns in Vale Royal, including Winsford.

"For the photographic exhibition we want community groups with cameras to snap shots in 1999 for exhibiton in the year 2000."

Andrea stressed that millions of applications have gone to the Millennium Lottery Fund and encouraged smaller projects to act on their own initiative.

One of these, Project 93, has its own Winsford 2000 weekend planned for January 15-17, involving bands, discos, an arts centre programme, a representation of residents for whom the year 2000 has special significance and a snapshot for an exhibition of Winsford at the turn of the millennium.

Converted for the new archive on 13 March 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.