North Yorkshire Councillor Cliff Trotter – once one of the BBC’s Unsung Heroes of Sport – has been elected chairman of the County Council for the next 12 months.
Councillor Trotter, who represents Pannal and Lower Wharfedale, takes over from County Councillor John Fort. He will chair meetings of the council and represent the authority at official functions and public events.
Councillor Trotter is a former milkman, and bicycle shop owner. He has been passionate about junior football for many years, and is the founder and Chairman of Harrogate Junior football League, in which 3,700 boys play every weekend. He is also the Chairman of the Harrogate and Wharfedale Junior League’s under 8s and under 9s, and founder and President of Pannal Ash Junior Football Club, which he started in 1978. More than four hundred boys between the ages of five and 18 play for Pannal Ash JFC.
It was Councillor Trotter’s activities with Pannal Ash which led to him receiving the BBC’s Unsung Hero of Sport award for the Yorkshire Region in 2009. The BBC praised him for making the training and playing of junior football fun for the players, and described him as “a very hands-on president of the club.”
Councillor Trotter has been a Member of North Yorkshire County Council for 16 years. He is also a Member of Harrogate Borough Council, and was Mayor of the Borough in 2008/09.
Councillor Trotter is married, with four children and seven grandchildren. His wife Jill runs her own chartered accountancy business in Harrogate, and is President-Elect of the Soroptomist International for the Harrogate district.
The Vice Chairman of the Council for the next 12 months is County Councillor Bernard Bateman, who represents Ripon North.
