Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Haringey's Warehouse Districts Under Threat?
An item at tonight's Council Cabinet meeting has thrown into question the future survival of Haringey's two warehouse districts and the artistic communities who live in them.
Both the Harringay Warehouse District and the Fountayne Road community now face an uncertain future following the publication of a Haringey Council report, "Tackling Unauthorised Living in Industrial Areas". (Report attached)
The report, which was discussed at the full cabinet of the Council today, recommends a two-year project costing £600,000 which will seek to deal with "the growing problem of unauthorised residential and live work uses in and around (the) Industrial Sites" in Haringey. The recommended process is "to establish a special multi-disciplinary team to fully investigate and address the problem through a combination of regulation, improvement, enforcement and, where necessary, prosecution".
The alarm bells were ringing for me since earlier in the week I had discovered that these areas are earmarked as being amongst those that will "will accommodate the majority of development in the borough over the next 20 years".
In Facebook and Twitter conversations this afternoon, warehouse residents shared their fears that the vibrancy their communities bring to the borough will be overlooked and their communities sanitised and destroyed.
In response to my Twitter requests to Council Leader Claire Kober this evening to protect these communities, Cllr Kober sought to offer some reassurance:
@harringayonline some people in unacceptable conditions. My concern is for safe, decent properties. No intention to undermine communities
@harringayonline no intention to damage what's good. Priority is to go after rogue landlords just as we do elsewhere in borough
When I asked if she would ensure that warehouse residents will be involved, the Council Leader replied:
@harringayonline don't see any problem involving residents. Will ask officers to consider how best to achieve
I very much hope that the approach the Council takes in this project will support these communities rather than beginning the process of whittling them away.
Tags for Forum Posts: local plan, local plan 2014, site allocation plan, warehouse district
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Hear hear!!! THIS!!! What band are you in for council tax? Do you not have any rubbish bins because you don't pay any? Perhaps your landlord could provide a separate refuse service along with the duplicated fire, police and ambulance services they manage.
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Permalink Reply by Tom Jubert on
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Let me try and field a few more answers, because I'm certain more transparency is a good thing.
Re: council tax. All our bills are included in the rent, so I'm not in a position to tell you exactly what is being paid, but we have always been assured that council tax is being paid. Are we paying residential or business rates? I honestly don't know, but I expect at least some are paying business rates still. This, of course, is not acceptable or sustainable looking forward, and as has been noted may well be responsible for some of the concerns we share over bin allocation etc. Of course, it's also a simple principle of fairness. My hope, naturally, is that we could solve that problem by ensuring we are paying residential rates if and where we are not, rather than knocking our homes down.
re: TV licence. Again, this is paid by the landlord, but I have actually seen a TV licence on paper, so I'm sure this is getting paid, by us at least.
Re: cold and other matters of habitability (aside from fire safety, which is being worked on extensively), yes there is some damp here and there, just as in every other house in the budget I've lived in. But these spaces are generally very comfortable and warm. We care about them and do them up in our own unique ways, and being all pushed together the warehouses generally are quite warm, even before we turn on the heating.
re: communication. I'd just like to chime in on a discussion from earlier about spreading the word locally about events and whatnot. I think the only reason that these haven't always been put up on notice boards and at local shops is just the invisibility of those platforms to a lot of people I live with. We are highly internet-oriented - everything that happens is talked about there - so we probably just don't think about using any other mediums. That we can definitely change.
Finally, I'd like to cross post a couple of things that were said recently on facebook about what some of the other warehouse residents think is worth saving.
"The Government bang on about 'diverse culture' and community spirit, but what they are trying to achieve as a 'directive' we the public have already done on our own."
"We contribute massively to the local economy, have independently regenerated huge parts of Tottenham/Harringey, and most importantly have naturally created a multi national-multi lingual-multi ethnic close-knit community."
Okay, I know not all the warehouses look regenerated from the outside, but we're working on it! Also I know the idea that these ex-business parks are now some kind of mecca for hippies from all over the world may sound horrific, but I'm proud that (aside from Mr Schulem's business interests) the warehouses have evolved naturally into this tightly knit yet diverse community.
I also imagine that I might single handedly support the local shop with my kettle chip purchases alone :-)
Any more questions, I'll be here.
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Permalink Reply by matt on
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OK, re business rates being paid, of course it's up to your landlord to provide for waste removal, which explains why the council isn't. As the landlord is raking in shed loads of money from his foray into residential rent he should up his game on all fronts, including better waste removal services. I do know someone who lives there. His stories are enlightening!
It all comes down to that landlord controlling a lot of the warehouses there. Will he play fair with you guys or will he bide his time and go along with the council & sell up to a national developer? Or maybe he doesn't own the land.
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Your guess is as good as mine. He's not big on direct communication.
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Permalink Reply by Hugh on
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The question that occurs to me is has the Council asked the residents to pay Council tax and would they pay it if asked?
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I've tried to get a straight answer out of Joe Goldberg. I thought he would be a good person as this is his ward and he is cabinet member responsible for finance. He's descended into gibberish so let me go out on a limb here and say that the reason their residential rubbish is not collected properly is because they don't pay residential council tax. Did someone say 700 dwellings? Conservatively I'd put that at HALF A MILLION POUNDS a year in council tax that is not being collected. Oh and look at them getting their collectivised acts together and voting en-bloc for whoever gives them what they want. Very jealous.
Did someone from there on HoL say that they'd had some politicians into their flat when they were out canvassing? 700 votes is enough to be elected in Seven Sisters this year, IMHO.
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I will immediately recommend everyone to sign up to vote, thanks for the tip! Sadly I do think it's probably 700 rooms (in the arena, overbury, hermitage triangle), not 700 warehouses.
To answer your question, I'm certain that if the choice is bulldozers or council tax everyone here would select the latter.
I don't know if it's true that we're not paying the council tax we should be (further addressed in my other post). But have we been given any opportunity to pay more council tax, by the council, or by the landlords? Nope.
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That's why your rubbish is not being collected. Suggest to your landlord that they do something about this. How about these guys?
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Sadly I've not got the ear of the big man, but I will definitely email the guy who rents our place off him and rents it back to us and ask him to suggest it the next time he's not being threatened with a rent increase.
I know that sounds ridiculous, because it is, but I will genuinely do it.
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Ah yes, the guy who started by converting one of the first places (so successfully that the landlord in question put the rent up!) and your sub-letting 'landlord' went on to convert other areas. Bit of a tricky situation when it comes to simple things like waste disposal etc.
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