In true Bath Place spirit, 4 weeks ago BPCV officially nominated the original home of Bath Place as an "Asset of Community Value" under the auspices of the Localism Act 2011. As you may or may not know, the building was mostly destroyed by fire in October of 2009 and Warwickshire County Council has declared the site surplus to requirements and earmarked it for disposal in the near future. Bath Place Community Venture has put forward a proposal for a rebuild of the damaged areas and bring the surviving sections back into use as a self-sustaining Community Centre based on our wide breadth of experience in asset management and programme delivery. We are currently seeking out key partnerships and support and in the last few weeks have made some valuable inroads towards that goal.
Chris White our MP for Warwick & Leamington, has joined us on the Board of Trustees and we have an agreement in principle to work alongside ESHWorks (Warwickshire Drug & Alcohol recovery) as a key partner and stakeholder in the project. We will also be exploring other partnerships with organisations working in mental health as we feel there is a great need for joined up service delivery that can incorporate a broad spectrum of support and engagement for not only Old Town Leamington, but the wider locality as well.
One of the key factors in deciding to nominate the site is that it fits in very well with the current national agenda around community rights and the importance of assets to the function and sustainability of Community and Voluntary organisations. Although the Localism Act is quite new it is a culmination of years of policy work and the end result of countless studies which emphasise the importance of mutual understanding and cooperation between Local Government and the Third Sector.
We feel that there is an enormous potential for the redevelopment of the Bath Place Community Centre and we hope that you will support us in our efforts to continue to provide the services, facilities and programmes in the way that we have, one way or another, since 1976.
This has also involved putting together a B
usiness Case to describe how we would use the site if the nomination was successful.
If you'd like to have a look, it's available as a PDF download on our website
here. If you have any questions, comments or would like to get involved, please feel free to get in touch.
Meanwhile, we are temporarily based at The Band Factory on Althorpe Street where we have a couple of large spaces for hire to community groups. We are currently hosting the Asian Mens Elders, The Japanese Toddlers Group every Tuesday from 10am and a Jelly group for people working from home see www.jelly.com on Mondays. In celebration of International Women's Day we hosted 'The Vagina Monologues', a presentation of the Warwick Anti-Sexism Society in support of CRASAC (Coventry Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre) with an audience of 160 people on March 9. It was a soaring, hilarious and very moving performance, congratulations go to all those involved.
A Word from the Chair
BPCV faces some challenging times. The members at the recent Annual General Meeting asked us to do all we could to acquire ourformer home in Bath Place. This involves complex negotiations with both the County Council, and the District Council, which should finish in April. If we succeed the Board then has to find the money to develop the project –fortunately there are funds that we can apply for to do this. If we fail, then we will face some hard choices about the future of the organisation, and where it gets funds from to continue our work. We are always looking to add skills to our Board so if you are interested, please get in touch.
David Williams 
