PRESS RELEASE
Secure Future for Crewe Allotments
The Town Council is pleased to confirm that it intends to issue a 50-year lease to the Crewe Town Allotment Federation to support the management of the eleven allotment sites in the Town. This will provide a firm foundation to take forward the development of the town’s allotments.
Town Councillor Suzanne Brookfield said ‘This really is good news; we have worked with the Federation in recent months and have made significant funds available to the Federation to enable the allotments to be brought up to modern standards. This lease arrangement gives the allotment holders control of the land and is a good deal for the Council Tax payer’.
‘We applaud the Federation for the positive way they have risen to the challenge. They are all volunteers and as such are enabling the sites to be managed without the need for the Council to cover management costs. With time, we fully expect the sites to be self-financing. If plot holders wish to have gold standard allotments they can do so as they will control how much they pay in rent’
‘I will be recommending to Council that a master lease be issued which will then mean the individual Associations can enter into a sub-lease for a 50 year period.’
ENDS
16/12/2014
Background notes
1) On the formation of the Town Council the Council became the owners of the eleven sites in Crewe. In the last few months, that ownership was formally confirmed by the Land Registry and the Council needs to confirm how it wishes to manage the sites.
2) It is the Council’s view that the best way to manage the sites is via the properly constituted Crewe Town Allotment Federation which as many will be aware is up and running. The Council takes this view, as it will mean that the Council does not need to levy any operational costs on plot holders and as such, income from the allotments can be recycled within the allotments themselves.
3) The Council has already made a considerable amount of funding available to the Federation, which is being used to provide for improvements at the sites.
4) The Council therefore intends to issue a master lease to the Federation once legal formalities are completed. The Federation will then be free to issue sub-leases to individual allotment Associations.
5) To occupy a site, each Association must have a sub-lease from the Federation to have legal standing. Associations may choose not to be Federation members, but they will require a lease from the Federation.
6) The Council actively encourages all sites to be members of the Federation.
7) Should a site not wish to take up a lease with the Federation then the Council may, reluctantly, be placed in a position where alternative management arrangements will need to be put in place. Such a model will be more expensive to manage as it will require income from the sites to be utilised by the Council for the purposes of operating the sites, as such all rents collected from individual plots will be payable to the Council.
