Centre site sale will free up council funds
New homes will be built after the sale of Adur District Council’s former headquarters site.
The sale of the Adur Civic Centre has been completed – ‘freeing up funds’ to invest in supporting the community and deliver ‘much-needed homes’, the council said.
A spokesperson added: “The Hyde Group is to pay the council £6m for the site at the junction between Brighton Road, Ham Road and Eastern Avenue in Shoreham on which Adur Civic Centre stood. The affordable housing provider will build 159 homes on the land – enough for 470 people.
"Every one of the new homes will be affordable, and more than 50 will be for social rent, to house Adur residents on the council’s housing list."
The income from the sale of the site cannot be used to pay for day-to-day council activity. Instead, the council will now consider whether it should use the funds to ‘reduce the cost’ of one or more of its ongoing projects for the community or to ‘invest them to generate income to support frontline services’.
"The council has worked with Hyde and the community to develop plans for the site that will provide a large amount of affordable housing without damaging the character of the area,” the spokesperson added.
“This included listening to the concerns of local residents that initial proposals for the site would have resulted in a large grey poplar tree having to be cut down.”
Officers and members of Adur's cabinet organised a series of meetings to ‘listen to the wishes of the community’.
They then worked with Hyde to come up with new proposals that involve the same number of flats being built but on a smaller section of the land – with the poplar tree being saved. A tree preservation order has been served and confirmed which gives greater protection for the grey poplar tree.
Steve Neocleous, Adur’s cabinet member for regeneration and strategic planning, said: “We’re always reviewing our assets and investments to make sure that every pound we have is working as hard for our residents as possible. We will continue to focus our funding on the projects and work that will benefit the community the most.”