Cabinet asked to approve pool funding in Bishop's Castle

Shropshire Council’s cabinet is being asked to approve £680,000 worth of funding to help decarbonise and refurbish a south Shropshire swimming pool.

The Bishop’s Castle Arts and Leisure Centre, also known as Sports and Arts in the Community or SpArC, shares a site with the town’s Community College, with a 20-metre four-lane pool being its centrepiece. Later additions have included a sports hall, fitness gym, arts studio and gallery space.

The centre is currently heated by an aging boiler which is expensive to operate, and a new heating system is a priority which also offers the potential to decarbonise the site. The pool hall has been severely damaged by recent storms and needs repairing.

The pool tank and plant also need substantial repairs and improvement, with the filtration system being slow to recycle water, and the pool tank needing constant repairs and relining before a major failure occurs. Installing easy access steps is also part of the scheme.

The total amount for the work stands at £3.939 million, of which £680,000 is proposed to come from the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL).

The majority (£2.454m) will be grant aid from the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme, while the Bishop’s Castle Trustees will donate £250,000 following a huge fundraising effort. The remaining amount (£505,000) will come from Shropshire Council’s capital repairs programme.
“SpArC has the benefit of being very well supported by its local community; there is an active group of trustees who raise significant funds to provide enhancements to the SpArC site,” said Laura Tyler, assistant director for joint commissioning.

“In previous years, they have already raised and invested over £250,000 including the provision of fitness equipment, a cafe, pocket park and donations towards the theatre and arts.

“To support the pool refurbishment, the trustees, with help from other community groups and parish councils, have raised a further £250,000 towards a new pool liner and easy access steps.

“This is a generous and unique contribution by a community towards their local leisure centre and is particularly notable when considering the relatively small population in the area.”

Ms Tyler added that the pool refurbishment project is estimated to cost £1.1m to complete. The trustees have already raised and committed £250,000 and the capital finance team have identified £170,000 from the budget. Once complete, the pool running costs are anticipated to be £12,000 lower per year and new users could increase by up to 30 per cent.

That leaves a shortfall of £680,000. It is therefore proposed that £300,000 be allocated from the Bishop’s Castle local CIL fund and the remaining £380,000 from the Strategic County CIL fund.

For the decarbonisation project, Shropshire Council has been awarded a £2.454m grant from the Government’s Public Sector Decarbonisation scheme to insulate the whole leisure centre and replace the existing oil-fired heating with an all-electric solution.

The grant is dependent on the council providing 12 per cent or £334,695 in match funding which will come from the capital repairs budget spread over three years. Once complete, the centre will have reduced carbon emissions by 70 per cent and is forecast to reduce running costs by 5 per cent. Cabinet will discuss the proposal on Wednesday (September 10).