Several Nottingham venues face uncertain futures as negotiations with the city council continue and some say they have "no timeline" for when they will end. As part of a financial transformation plan, Nottingham City Council has been reviewing all of its commercial properties and putting some of them up for auction.
On top of this, the authority has also been reviewing the community groups that use its buildings to "reduce financial burden on the council." Some of the businesses and community groups affected by these discussions say their future is still unclear months after negotiations first began.
One business affected by the council's commercial property review has been Peggy's Skylight, an intimate jazz venue in Hockley which has been operating to great acclaim since 2018. The business first learnt last November that Nottingham City Council were putting its building up for sale, with an auction initially proposed for February 23.
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The council then delayed this auction and the business now says it has applied for a special status which would give it six months to raise funds to buy the building. One of its founders, Paul Deats, said: "We've applied for 'Asset of Community Value' status, which is currently being considered by Nottingham City Council.
"This would allow us to enact a moratorium period whereby the property could not be sold, unless to ourselves, for a period of six months. This would allow us time to raise the money needed to make an offer to buy. We're working on a fundraising plan, details of which will be made public in the coming weeks."
In terms of discussions with community groups, one of those affected has been The Place Activity Centre in Sherwood. Operating since 1997, the centre had been paying a peppercorn rent of £10 a year to the city council.
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. A meeting was then held where Nottingham City Council leader David Mellen said the centre could submit an application for reduced rent.
The centre has to prove it is delivering "quantifiable community benefits" to get this reduced rent and in terms of the latest position, centre chairman Thulani Molife said: "At the moment we are being used essentially as the lead organisation for the council's new policy that it wants to use with all community centres.
"We're still in negotiations and the difficulty is in proving the community benefit that the council wants to see. The centre is actually doing well through this and we've got a good number of groups using it. The council has agreed to keep us on our peppercorn rent for now, but I've not got any timeline for when things will progress."
Another community centre still in talks is the Mapperley Community Association, whose manager claimed they had been threatened with eviction by the city council from their Woodborough Road building in February. The council now says this was "never an option" and have instead proposed charging the association a commercial rent of £8,000.
Manager Phil Merry said: "The council want to put our rent up to £8,000, but they are also saying they want us to take full responsibility for the building. We've kept this building in very good order, but signing these terms would mean us paying for everything from repairs to lighting.
"I've been told that the end of June is the council's target to have this sorted. This is a community centre and yet they're talking about putting us on full commercial rent and giving all maintenance responsibility to us."
A Nottingham City Council spokesperson confirmed that reviews into its commercial properties and community assets remain ongoing. They said: "We are continuing a structured review of our commercial property portfolio and will continue to bring selected assets to the market for disposal with a view to generating income.
"We are also reviewing our community assets to ensure that they are fit for purpose and to reduce financial burden on the council. Where appropriate, there may also be opportunities to consider transferring assets to community groups, which we fully recognise can bring benefits in some instances."
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