Meeting the challenge – doing Community-led Homes (CLH) when communities cannot commune…

Though it’s not easy to do community-led homes projects when communities cannot meet, most projects have been able to make steady progress, even if at a pace a little slower than hoped. Thanks to our wonderful frontline key workers we’ve used the postal service in recent weeks to consult in Newlyn, St Dennis, Carleen and Ruan Minor and have further activities and events planned in each location – with virtual if not real meetings and events planned in other communities later this year.

A further challenge to the charitable housing sector in Cornwall and Scilly is the very high demand for property for people who believe the UK’s future will involve an on-going use of restrictive working to combat an extended and long tail to the Covid pandemic. Opportunities have shrunk as property prices remain high.

 

Nevertheless, we’re delighted that we can report good progress at Ruan Minor where Grade Ruan CLT’s plan to provide 6 good quality affordable homes protected in perpetuity for local people are now nearing completion and will be ready for occupation in early summer. We’ve held one (online webinar) event for potential local applicants on 2^nd Feb. A second event will be held at 5.30pm on Tuesday 16^th Feb. If you’d like to attend please either call Cornwall Community Land Trust on 01872 243554 or email on g.

We’ve completed a recent consultation event at St Dennis where we  have made an application for 23 affordable homes for rent and will hold two public (online) consultation events at Newlyn where the Newlyn Housing Working Party and CCLT hope to submit a planning application soon for 29 affordable rent and part-buy homes which like our other projects will be of good quality and will be protected for locals in perpetuity. Consultation events take place on 2^nd and 3^rd March –To register for the Newlyn online events on the 2^nd and 3^rd March, please either call Cornwall Community Land Trust on 01872 243554 or email on g.

We’re also making good progress with a dozen other community groups including Truro and St Ives CLTs.

Look out for more details of our next virtual CLH seminar on Wednesday 14^th April. We’ll be concentrating on the many stages of financing community-led housing projects – from the very early stages, to pre-development, development and long-term management. Each require different mechanisms and solutions and Cornwall has a wealth of experience to show how it can be done.