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St Marys Redevelopment

On 19 Oct 2015 at 5:18pm via Ruth O'Keefe wrote:

LDC development sites in Lewes: St Mary's Social Centre on Christie Road

The plan for St Mary's as written on the LDC leaflet that should be going to everyone in Lewes is for "a small number" of "affordable Council-owned homes alongside a new and better community centre".

None of the houses planned for Lewes Town are "social" housing at around 50% of full market prices. Some is "affordable" which is set at 80% of market price. All the other sites in Lewes Town other than St Mary's appear to be planned to have full market price housing.

A lot of concerns have been raised about the space left to put a community centre on the St Mary's site if there are houses built there, as all of the land is used for the social club, the hall, the outside nursery play space and the car park.
Another concern is the level of rent that might be charged for a new centre, given that the old one is already �10,000 to rent. Although questions have been asked about the planned rent for a new centre no answers have been given.

In addition the disruption of building and demolition is something many people feel would be of great harm to the programme of activities at the centre.
As a result of all the public outcry about the possible loss of facilities the District Council has made different provision for this site from the others.

The leaflet states �We are working closely with the trustees of the centre and will not pursue any development if they are not on board with the proposals�
A number of people have asked me for the best way to get in contact with the trustees to let them know of public concerns about the proposals.

Please write to
The Trustees of St Mary�s
c/o St Mary�s Social Centre
Christie Road
Lewes
BN7 1PL

The Chair of the trustees has let me know that they are happy to receive letters from residents. At the moment the trustees are awaiting further contact with the proposed developers and do not yet know what the plans are for the site in any detail, and so have not had the chance to officially say whether they are �on board with the proposals� or not.