NEMCA will be celebrating it’s 45th anniversary next year. Our chair Linda Kirby reflects on how it all started:
NEMCA – NORTH EAST MITCHAM COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION HISTORY
Nemca opened its doors in 1982 and since then, has been a vibrant community hub for our area.
Before it was built, the M23 Motorway extension from Hooley was planned to come through part of the ward and the area was blighted. When the plans were scrapped a group called North East Mitcham Improvement Action Group was set up. Ex Councillor Geraldine Stanford and I were part of that group.
Our aim was to ensure that the insecure licences that tenants and sub tenants held were regularised and that people were given the offer of purchasing their properties at below market value. This was fair because the government had compulsorily purchased them. This was agreed.
We paid £12,500 for our 3 bedroomed house. The market value for a similar house then was £24,000. Things have changed a lot since then on house prices.
Once we completed that task we started to look at how we could improve the area. We arranged for a Playbus to visit the Edenvale Park area which was very popular. We then successfully applied for an Urban Aid grant of £75,000 to build a community centre.
Planning only allowed us to operate weekdays. There was concern that we’d have a youth club and it would all get rowdy. We reapplied for permission to open at the weekends and it was granted. We opened our Youth Club and it wasn’t rowdy.
The NHS set up a children’s clinic in an annexe building but they left the site about the time the Figges Marsh Surgery opened.
Jollytime Playgroup were there at the start.
Initially, a team of volunteers managed the centre, some of whom are still there now. I ran a parent toddler group throughout the year. We applied for grant funding from Merton and were then able to recruit a centre manager. Barbara Cluer was our first appointment, she left us to set up Home Start Merton. Sylvester Parris and Eleanor Shelley were our joint managers for a period of time . We ran breakfast and afterschool clubs for Links, Beecholme and Gorringe had holiday schemes and lots of other activities for the whole family. It had become a child-centred Community Hub.
When the schools opened their own breakfast, afterschool clubs and holiday schemes, the heart of the centre seemed to disappear. Eleanor and Sylvester were replaced by our current centre manager, Tina Humphries, whose job was to bring vibrancy back to the centre which she did. Sadly, 3 years ago, we lost the Playgroup because the birth rate dropped dramatically. Making long-term staff redundant was a very difficult thing and once again we had to review how we filled the space left in the morning with the Playgroup gone. Tina left at this point and Emily Williams became the centre manager.
The annexe building was condemned and removed in August 2025 and plans for its replacement are being discussed currently. Emily is no longer with us but we are delighted to have Tina back with us once more.
Next year will be our 45th birthday so a big party will be held to celebrate the occasion.
We have been grateful to Merton for its continuous financial support and to all the lovely groups and activities that take place at NEMCA in the heart of our community.
Linda Kirby
Chair, Nemca