jimbow
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Alunh:-You have summed up what the end product should be very well. Unfortunately, it is being led by Council Officers who have no experience whatsoever in running a market.
Jane:-There are 16 on the Planning Committee. I think you are looking at the attendees for the 4 meetings this year. These will include councillors supporting an application but not necessarily having a vote.
I believe the lead member has gone beyond the terms of reference and should resign. If ever there was a Lead Member for Sewage, in my opinion he is ready-made for it, as he talks a lot of it.
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JaneJ:- I doubt it very much. The present situation being, all was passed as OK at the last Executive Board, committing £3.5 million to the project.
In a SAMP Report-To comprehensively refurbish the property to an overall standard that would be considered excellent, in the region of £128,000 for the General and £290,000 for the Butchers would need to be spent.
The Executive Board at its meeting in March 2020 committed £2 million to the Butchers Market alone.
Prior to this meeting, I emailed all members of the Executive Board with the following:- Before you, is a Report asking for £2 million for the Butchers Market alone. I write in the hope that you come to your senses and reduce the allocation of funds to that which is realistically needed £290,000.
Alas, it has now risen to £3.5 million,
What difference will we see in the market for this money?
Whilst privately owned, they are committed to working around benefitting the community. I don’t think this is such a bad thing.
Jane, are those the same concerts that are held on the Racecourse? The very venue whose clientele support local business.
I can understand your point that the Racecourse is 100% privately owned. I am quite sure that funding however will be coming from quite a few different sources. One must not forget the amount of revenue that is brought into the city from the 10,000 plus attendances boosting local eateries, hotels etc., There is also the publicity that comes with the success. The football club in the past and hopefully in the future have been Wrexham’s only publicity weapon. Ty Pawb cost £4.5 million and still loses, £245k and that’s the Jewel in the Crown.
You make a fair point. However, there are a lot of goings-on in markets and infighting. You can have the situation that a trader wants the monopoly of the goods he sells. It used to be when a trader enters into a stall agreement he has to nominate the goods he wants to trade in and the market’s supervision have the problems of sorting it out. This used to be the case in Wrexham Markets not so long ago. It is finding the person to initially set up the premises, from which to start up in. I can honestly say that if I was to go back into the market, I would have no idea what to trade in that would support my wife and two kids. It is so, so hard.
JaneJ Good idea, but there are a lot of sole traders and hopeful startups and tying them down to an occupancy period could be fraught with danger for those that initially rent the building. I notice the Council are putting aside £368,063k for the decant of stallholders from Butchers/General Markets to I believe premises in Regent Street whilst rebuilding takes place. How much of that the Council will recover in rents from those that move remains to be seen
I have been looking at the Sustainability Report June 2022 on the Butchers and General Markets going before the Executive Board next Tuesday.
If the Council believe they will attract new and expect the present clients to return on the completion of the refurbishment, I believe they should seriously think again if they intend on charging rent and services as outlined in the report.
A present perimeter stall commands a Rent/Service charge of £2,748. After the refurbishment of the same size stall the Rent/Service Charge increases to £4680 an increase of 30%. There will be some discounts given in the early years, but for a sole trader, this 30% increase does not bode well for the future.
According to the Report, the Service Charges quoted, I worked out as being £125.07 per square metre for the Butchers Market and a staggering £202.03 per square metre for the General Market. Something is amiss.
