TDC buys church site
The Tasman District Council is buying the Methodist church site in central Richmond for $3 million.
The 1801m2 property on the corner of Wensley Rd and Queen St includes the Ernest Loney Memorial Methodist Hall, the grounds and a car park. It is across Wensley Rd from the council’s main Richmond campus.
Council community infrastructure group manager Richard Kirby said the purchase of the Methodist property would provide options for accommodating council staff and services. The TDC is due to take possession of the site on August 17.
News of the purchase comes as the council faces constrained space for a growing number of staff in an earthquakeprone hotchpotch of buildings on its main campus. The property is at capacity, with about 30 staff working off site in leased satellite offices on Wensley Rd and in the Richmond Mall building.
In 2020, the Queen St suite of offices as a whole was found to be at less than 34 per cent of the new building standard.
The council also owns the Queen St property on the other side of its Richmond campus, which includes Armadillo’s restaurant and bar.
‘‘We have so many options with the purchase of this property,’’ Kirby said of the Methodist church site.
If the eventual redevelopment of the council’s accommodation did not use the property, it could be sold again.
In November, councillors agreed that a preferred accommodation proposal – either council-built and owned, or leased – is to be developed for inclusion in the Long Term Plan 2024-34. Kirby said options would be developed in 2023 for community consultation, ready for inclusion in the draft Long Term Plan in first half of 2024.
The church hall building at the rear of the Methodist property could be fitted out and used as temporary additional office space. By doing so, the council might be able to release its leases on the satellite offices in Richmond, Kirby said.
The $3m cost of buying the Methodist church site will come from a general property budget placeholder of $6m in the Long Term Plan 2021-31.
Other funds from that $6m would be used for some upgrade work on the main campus, Kirby said.
The Richmond Methodist Church was originally built on Salisbury Rd in 1844, the first church of any denomination in Richmond. A subsequent two-storey Gothic church was built on the Wensley Rd site in 1913, followed by the Ernest Loney hall in 1952.