Applications open for summer events at Hornsey Town Hall

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Permalink Reply by Chris Setz on March 15, 2013 at 9:48

Hornsey Town Hall (HTH for short) has been empty for a very long time. It's making more than the cost of it's upkeep from the main part (blue in the diagram below) being rented out to film companies (e.g. the one making the BBC TV series 'The Hour, who've been there for two seasons so far but don't use it most of the year').

Large portions are not being rented and lie empty in a ward where there is little non-privatised public space.  The annexe, for instance, is full of office space and empty for almost a year now. could be used whilst the main part was being used for filming, reducing the security levy to almost nothing.

I think a shadowy group - the 'HTH Interim Uses Committee' (HTHIUC) - that meet inside the LBH planning department and make these decisions about  letting residents use tiny parts of HTH - we are not allowed to see agendas, minutes, details of those present etc.

As far as I know, no local Cllrs are involved in their decisions. I don't think records are kept of who decides what or why. Nobody seems able to say what has been decided, who they've met, or why.

They have said let it slip that there is at least one non-council official who may be on it sometimes. That could be someone from the Hornsey Town Hall Creative Trust, (another shadowy body, who, despite having spent £2m on  extensive plans for HTH that the Council quashed last year without warning, don't allow people anywhere near them and never say what input if any they have to HTHIUC)

I noticed the webpage announcement last year but most people would not have, as their was no announcement of it, no contact details, no 'sign-up to be emailed when this web page changes' as there are on other pages containing public announcements. There being so many 'orphan' webpages on the LBH website, it's almost as if it's a place where you can fulfil your duty to let residents know without actually letting residents know.

 

 The rates are considerably higher than they have previously charged, back when HTH was occupied by LBH staff. 

 

I think these rates (£300 per day) will inevitably lead LBH to be able to prove to the themselves in the planning process that there is absolutely no demand from local people, further justifying them handing over the building  to a private school for the next 125 years @ £1/yr rent.

 

The tenant seems to have secured a confidential promise from LBH (documents are marked 'exempt' as they're 'in commercial confidence') that LBH will spend up to £20m of our precious money turning HTH into a luxury HQ. Most of this money is intended to come from the profit from developers of building luxury flats on the car park, which they have freed of any obligation to provide 'affordable' housing. They've also prevented residents using this open space next to the library, probably in case anyone realises that huge parts could be used as interim community space.

 

The prospective tenant, in a confidential application, has won £4m of public money to re-wire, replumb and replace the lifts etc. It was backed by a letter from the Creative Trust endorsing it. It's all too secret to know if the work has already begun, but I doubt it.

The tenant is wealthy enough to have been able to negotiate off LBH to take up the space of 50 dwellings in the car park. They intend to demolish the 1930's clinic and build an outside rehearsal studio there. I think the clinic is in good condition and used for meetings but empty a lot of the time - it'd make an excellent interim community space. The car park itself is unusable as such because it is deemed 'unsafe' due to puddles - difficult to know who decided that, why LBH cars can use it etc...

 

I have not yet been able to discover why the rates are so high, nor if:

a) Only part of the three rooms can be used at a lower cost

b) If it can be made cheaper by using them at a time when the two security staff are there anyway.

c) How much of the rental cost LBH are charging us for policing HTH during the rental.

d) If local people could be trusted to keep the building secure during it's use (the people from the Creative Trust for instance), so removing what may be a significant element of the cost.

e) When the building is in use by the film company.

f) How much of the building is in use by the film company.  They don't use either the clinic or the set of offices next to Spiazzo's.  Both could be made available but I guess they wouldn't want the admin headache as the department has other fish to fry.

g) Why the remaining money from the sale of the nearby Citizens Advice Bureau, all of which is available to be spent on HTH (less that used to de-asbetos the Council Chamber), cannot be spent fixing up the seating in the Council Chamber so that we can use that as well as the Cttee Rooms. 

 

I don't think anyone is deliberately destroying anything, it's just that people are too busy on more important stuff to be concerned what happens and don't live or work around here. The danger of these sorts of objection is that it might lead to an empty building but wait, that's what we've already got, isn't it? Except that now, for the first time in this long saga, the building is more than covering it's costs through rentals, so there's no hurry, is there, to permanently remove this profit from LBH at huge cost at a time when it needs all the money it can get?

 

The tenant is rich enough to be able to pay rent - they're paying £600k/yr for their current, much less salubrious Wood Green premises.  Were they to pay a commercial rent, the money could be used to subsidise a mix of free and chargeable use by local people.

 

If the Council Chamber were only used for local 'Assembly Forum' meetings, I think it would help people realise that HTH is a community asset, about to be closed to us for the next 125 years due to our apparent indifference to this large 2acre  public space right in the middle of our town. 

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