Plans to restore a Moray landmark suffered a setback yesterday when the councillors tasked with ruling on a £260,000 funding request discovered they did not have the authority to decide its fate.
The Fochabers Village Association Ltd had hoped to secure a community asset transfer worth £110,000 for the Fochabers Institute, and a £150,000 grant for urgent repairs to the dilapidated venue.
However, when Moray Council’s policy and resources committee met yesterday to determine the bid, they learned a technicality meant they were not entitled to approve the plans.
The local authority’s corporate director Mark Palmer said he had learned yesterday morning that funding decisions of over £50,000 could only be made by the full council.
The setback means the Fochabers bid will not be considered until the next full council meeting on Wednesday, June 24, at the earliest.
The team behind the scheme said the delay had put the brakes on its plans to safeguard the century-old hall.
The venue had been deteriorating under council ownership, but in the two years since the Fochabers Village Association Ltd took over its running user numbers have doubled.
The council funding was intended to kick-start a £700,000 refurbishment process.
Chairman of the Fochabers Village Association Ltd, Gordon Christie, said yesterday’s decision had come as a shock.
“That was not quite what I expected,” he said.
“It was only during the meeting that I learned the policy and resources committee was unable to make a decision, so it came as a surprise.
“Originally we hoped to have the work done this summertime but that will now face a delay.”
Councillors were also told the association’s business case was not strong enough for them to base a decision on – and that prolonging the application until June would give the group a chance to present a better proposal.
However, Mr Christie said the village association submitted its plans in February and had received no communication from the council since then.
He explained: “We have had no feedback since we submitted the business plan, but we thought that it fully addressed all the benefits a community asset transfer would bring to the council.
“I’m interested to find out what the council considered the failings to be. However, I understand the council has other commitments to deal with, and accept that the community asset transfer process can be a tricky one.
“The reason we are asking the council to fund repairs is because it allowed the Institute to fall into dilapidation over a 20-year period under its control.”
Fochabers and Lhanbryde councillor Douglas Ross condemned the lack of communication between council officers and the association.
He said: “That we could not make a decision on this was not fed back to local members, and throughout this process there has been a lack of dialogue between the council and members of the Fochabers Village Association Ltd.
“The group is desperate to get the approval to move this forward and this delay will have a knock-on effect on the funding streams that are essential for this project to go further.”
Councillor Ross added: “The building is in the state it’s in because the council has neglected it in many ways over a number of years.”
Forres Councillor Anne Skene said she was worried that the local authority could be setting a risky precedent by granting £150,000 funding in addition to a community asset transfer.
She argued that the committee should not recommend that the full council approve the requests, only that it consider them, and this was carried by seven votes to five.
Members were also given an assurance by Mr Palmer that yesterday’s finding would not invalidate any previous decisions the committee had made.