Our team has been busy since we won the council competition to build affordable homes on The Lawns. We’re getting all set up so we can start to design the homes and put in for planning permission in the new year.
We’ve managed to secure just shy of £26,000 of funding to get us started. Thank you to our ward councillor, Stephen Mann, and to the London CLH Hub for the support!
The Project Board, chaired by Rob, has been meeting every two or three weeks in this set up phase. We’ve met with Croydon Council, Brick by Brick, four architecture practices and the London CLH Hub to make plans and begin to agree how we could work together.
We’ve also put out an invitation to tender for anyone who could work as our Project Co-ordinator, a paid position. The deadline is the 18th November.
Meanwhile, our community team has been reaching out to local churches, schools and community groups to spread the word and invite people to become members of the CLT. We really need more volunteers to help with this work, so please get in touch if you can help with this newsletter, social media and community outreach!
The Lawns – resident design group
We’ve started to deliver letters to people living on, and near to, The Lawns inviting them to join our resident design group.
We want to recruit a group of people living on The Lawns and neighbouring roads to develop the brief for the architects in the new year. As part of the group you will set out the challenges like parking and views and anything else that matters to the group – maybe what the homes look like, or the kind of affordability, or how to make the homes ‘green’. You – not the council or a developer – will be in charge of the brief.
We will put on some training for you before the group gets going. This might cover things like viability – learning how your decisions will affect the costs and income from the project. We’re not-for-profit and run by volunteers, but we still have to come up with a project that pays for itself.
In all, you will need to take part in maybe three afternoon or all day workshops between January and March. They’ll probably be at weekends, or perhaps some evening meetings.
If you live on or near to The Lawns and are interested please get in touch. We can meet or call you to talk it over and ask any questions you might have.
Finance and legal skills needed
We’d like to recruit two or three more Directors for the Board of the CLT. We’d particularly like someone with financial skills to act as Treasurer.
We’d also like someone to give us some pro bono legal support, just to give the occasional question a once-over to help us decide when we need to pay solicitors for professional advice.
If you’re interested, get in touch and we can talk about what it would involve.
What’s next?
In the run up to Christmas we’ll be focused on agreeing terms with Croydon Council, Brick by Brick and our chosen architects.
We’ll also be planning for the start of the design process in the new year with the residents’ group, and fundraising to keep the show on the road!