RESIDENTS in a former mining village are hoping to rejuvenate their community.

Grange Villa, near Chester-le-Street, has suffered due to a lack of amenities, but residents are hoping to get funding to help build a community centre and millennium garden.

The Grange Villa Community Enterprise group is putting together a bid for £600,000 of National Lottery cash to help build a community centre.

The village's run-down former school houses the current community centre, but residents say a new building would help rejuvenate community spirit.

Without a pub and other amenities, Grange Villa's only genuine meeting place is the working men's club.

It's hoped a community centre with a range of facilities will help revitalise the village. The enterprise group wants to have the project up and running by next spring.

Meanwhile, Grange Villa Action Group has applied for £20,000 funds from several agencies to turn a village eyesore into a millennium garden.

The derelict land, in Front Street, is an overgrown mess, but members want to transform it into a landscaped garden with chessboard-style centrepiece, shrub and rockery beds, and disabled access.