New cafe to leave park volunteers without a base
Warning group could fold after hut torn down
Furious volunteers who maintain an award-winning Maidstone park say they could be forced to disband following the demolition of their base to make way for a new cafe.
The borough council is in the process of building a new £2.5m snack bar for Mote Park.
But as part of the construction process it has told the 20 or so volunteers who give their time each week to tend to the 450-acre green space, as part of the Mote Park Fellowship, that it will have to knock down their hut.
They have been given until Wednesday to clear out.
The builders, BBS, want to use the spot to store spoil dug from the new cafe’s foundations.
Brian Smith-Lowther is a committee member for the Mote Park Fellowship and has been volunteering in the park for the past 12 years.
He is one of a dedicated group of men and women who meet every Wednesday to work in the grounds, doing jobs such as lopping the branches off fallen trees, spreading bark, or planting up the waterfall.
He said: “We do the extra jobs that the council’s parks staff don’t have time for.”
The group keeps tools from wheel-barrows and pruners to saws, hoes and rakes in the shed, as well as a fridge, freezer and microwave for breaks.
They also use it for shelter in bad weather.
Mr Smith-Lowther said: “The park manager has said we can have a 7ft by 5ft room within the new cafe complex when it is completed, but firstly that will not be big enough even just for the wheelbarrows, and secondly, where do we go in the meantime?
“This is no way to treat the volunteers.”
When the plans for the cafe were initially developed, the volunteers were told their hut, an old portable cabin, would be relocated behind Maidstone Leisure Centre.
But that idea has been dropped with Maidstone council saying the hut is in such a state of disrepair that it could not be moved.
Mr Smith-Lowther warned: “If the volunteers’ group is forced to disband, Mote Park will soon
lose its Green Flag status.”
A spokeswoman for Maidstone council insisted the hut was only ever a temporary measure and insisted the group would be given facilities and storage space in the new cafe building.
They will also be able to use the MBC Estate Services building to keep their larger equipment.
Until the new site is ready they have been offered space in the brick toilet adjacent to the hut, that is also due for demolition.