Nottingham City Council says it will consider reducing a planned rent increase for a Sherwood community centre after originally proposing to hike it by tens of thousands. The Place Activity Centre has been used as a venue by community groups, local MPs and neighbourhood watch meetings since it started operating in 1997.
The centre has been paying a peppercorn rent of £10 a year to the building's owner, Nottingham City Council, since that time. But staff at the centre were informed in 2020 that its rent would be increased to a commercial level of £12,000, eventually going up to £20,000 within four years.
The first payment of this was due last year, but an administrative error meant an invoice for the original peppercorn rent was sent and paid. But the city council originally said they still wanted last year's rent paying at the full commercial level and as part of the plans to eventually increase the rent to £20,000, the Place Activity Centre was facing a £14,000 bill at the end of September.
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But Thulani Molife, who has been the chairman of the centre for the last eight years, says the centre had a meeting with Nottingham City Council leader David Mellen on October 10 where a new offer was put forward. Councillor Mellen confirmed: "I have met with the organisation together with officers and local councillors, and we have told them if they can demonstrate they are a properly constituted and not-for-profit organisation, they can submit an application for reduced rent for our consideration.
"This is on the basis they can show they are delivering quantifiable community benefits that meet the needs of the local community in accordance with the council's corporate priorities. This is an ongoing process and in the meantime we have agreed to keep them on the current rent arrangements."
Mr Molife confirmed the centre had now been given a document to fill out where it has to demonstrate its benefits to the local community, but he said: "It's a very weighty document and there's a lot of clarification needed because it isn't written for the layman.
"That all needs to go into the machine, get returned out and then hopefully we'll get a decision, but there's no timescale for the decision. It's not clear what outcomes you measure, that's the problem, we need to know exactly what they're looking for."
Nottingham City Council previously told Nottinghamshire Live that moving some community groups and charities to market rates was part of work to address the authority's financial challenges. Councillor Mellen confirmed: "Many existing agreements with community organisations leasing council premises like The Place in Sherwood leave the council receiving only nominal rents while retaining significant repairing liabilities, which is not a sustainable position.
"We are undertaking a review of all these arrangements across the city to ensure fair and robust agreements are in place with all of our tenants." Thulani Molife added: "After having that meeting with Councillor Mellen, we're moving to openly marketing ourselves for new groups to come in.
"Our worst fear was that no matter what we did, the council would come in and say that's it. But now we're trying to get new groups in and get ourselves marketed.
"It's a little bit more positive but to be quite honest, what we need next is for the council to get us as close to the original peppercorn rent as we can. It means we can start properly planning for the future, because we can't afford what they've asked for."
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