Bolton Council lists centres and pocket parks for CATs

This comes as part of Bolton Council’s community asset transfer scheme, which will see sites like Rock Hall in Moses Gate, two pocket parks in Blackrod and others leave council ownership.

A town hall meeting this week heard how this was also aimed at cutting costs at a time when the authority was continuing to face pressures.

Cabinet member for regulation and property Cllr Sue Haworth said: “We continue to face reduced finances in the council so there remains a degree of win-win with community asset transfers.”

The corporate and commercial issues scrutiny meeting heard that the current list of council properties earmarked for to be handed over to community groups included historic Rock Hall.

The Cobden Centre in Halliwell is one of several to have been listed for community asset transfers (Image: Google Maps)

The hall is to be handed over to Banana Enterprises, while a lease agreement had nearly been completed for Washacre in Westhoughton, to be taken over by the Darren Deady Foundation.

Sites including Sunnyside in Great Lever, the Blackrod Community Centre, the New Bury Community Centre in Farnworth and the Cobden Community Centre were also listed.

The council said that it hoped to review its arrangements about community centres and that it hoped to form a standardised approach to them.

Two pocket parks in Blackrod at Ridgeway and the Rose Gardens had also been listed, with the council saying it was willing to look at transferring them to the town council.

The Willow Park site at Runworth Park had also been recommended for a community asset transfer.

But the council heard how there was an existing tenant under new board of trustees who was hoping to repair the property per the existing lease agreement.

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Finally, a community asset transfer had been paused for the Halliwell UCAN centre, which is being used temporarily by Thomasson Memorial School.

Bolton Council leader Cllr Nick Peel said that he hoped this would help form stronger bonds between the authority and other organisations.

He said: “Doing CAT or any other form of community empowerment shouldn’t only be from a desire to make savings.

“It should also be from a motivation for a genuine partnership with a very strong voluntary and community sector who are often the very best placed to run these types of facilities and services and the council moving away from what I would regard as a very old fashioned paternalistic role.”