Jubilee Gardens - Enhancements Planned
September 2003
The Parish Council is now in a position to happily confirm that funding
has been secured for the landscaping and environmental enhancements
to the Jubilee Gardens. The scheme came about after the plans for
affordable housing on the land had to be abandoned when the high
cost of building land in the village made the Council’s scheme
to provide some low cost housing for village people impracticable
for housing associations to take on.
The new project, designed by landscape architect Fenella Bellinger
(who was responsible for the award-winning Quorn Cross scheme) aims
to improve the existing open space and provide access for people
for all abilities. The proposal hopes to encourage use by local people,
community groups and schools.
The main source of funding was intended to be the new FLAG grant
scheme, administered by Leicestershire County Council. The application
was for £50,000 of the £70,000 total. Due to huge county-wide
interest in this fund, the Parish Council experienced a worrying
moment when warned that it was unlikely to receive the full amount
requested. The County officers however have worked extremely hard
on our behalf and managed to ‘patch together’ an offer
of £40,000 made up from their FLAG, Shire and Village & Town
Centre Improvement budget. This funding, coupled with the Parish
Council’s £20,000 contribution left a shortfall of £10,000.
At a recent Parish Council meeting, the members
voted to take the shortfall out of reserves in order to enable the
project
to proceed. We have high hopes of a grant application to Charnwood
Borough Council for environmental improvements being successful in
the new financial year, so the reserve money would only therefore,
be ‘borrowed’.
As the conditions attached to the other grants insist that the project
is completed and invoices submitted by February 2004, subject to
planning permission, this unusually, is one local government project
that may happen very soon!
The Parish Council is now in a position to happily confirm that funding
has been secured for the landscaping and environmental enhancements
to the Jubilee Gardens. The scheme came about after the plans for
affordable housing on the land had to be abandoned when the high
cost of building land in the village made the Council’s scheme
to provide some low cost housing for village people impracticable
for housing associations to take on.
