THE year may well be drawing to a close, but one village is already making plans to make the most of 2008.

During the last few months a band of volunteers from Kingswood have been working hard to help produce a village plan.

The idea was launched at Kingswood's annual meeting last year and was taken up by a small steering group, which has now finished writing a questionnaire for the wider Kingswood community to complete, which will form the basis of the plan.

Rod Alexander, a member of the steering group, said: "We will be delivering the questionnaire to people's doors and explaining what it is about and what will happen next and answering their questions."

It is hoped the questionnaire will be available to villagers sometime in the New Year.

However, organisers have said more community involvement is needed if the questionnaire's results are to be productive.

Angela Burlow, from Gloucestershire Rural Community Council, has been helping the Kingswood steering group.

She said: "After the questionnaire we are left with a huge amount of data which is the bones of the plan and with the data we sift through what is important.

"We then hold open events to allow members of the community to come and look at everything and start to talk about what can be done and what needs to be prioritised."

David Rockey, chairman of Kingswood Parish Council, said for the village plan to work its priorities needed to come from the village itself.

He said: "I would like to thank all those involved who have taken the time to get involved in this project so far.

"In a small village like ours, there are the usual small number who step up to the mark and it's important we catch the attention of the wider community.

"Once we have all the data we don't want to just leave it to gather dust, we want to take the data and this village forward, so we need as many on board as possible."