Community Asset Transfer helping reduce costs

Community Asset Transfer is on the up, driven mostly by councils looking to maintain or evolve services while reducing location costs, according to Locality, the network for community-led organisations.
One hundred and fifty councils have Community Asset Transfer policies or mention of it in their asset management plans, according to Locality’s head of assets Annemarie Naylor. Over 12 months 1500 transfers were being worked on, an increase of 50% on the previous year.

Northampton Borough Council has transferred seven of its community centres to community groups over the last two years. It expects all its community centres to become community managed in the two years to come.

“Transferring isn’t a quick financial win,” head of corporate assets at Northampton, Simon Dougal, told Room 151. “The financial benefit is more in the medium term for the borough, and alongside that the benefit is that you are getting better use from the centres.”

The work started in 2009 when the council was looking for savings in the community centre budgets and initially hopes were of transferring the centres to other management as soon as possible. “There are inevitably initial concerns from community groups that it is just a way of offloading liabilities that the council doesn’t want any more,” explained Dougal. “There needs to be a proper engagement programme and you need to invest time and effort to do it properly.”

The council dealt with a number of community groups and was involved in helping some become incorporated and produce business plans. The seven centres are leased out to the groups, which are responsible for running them and internal maintenance. The council retains responsibility for external maintenance and insurance.

“It’s not a case of the borough signing a lease and leaving them to it,” said Dougal. “There is phased, tapering financial support to help them maintain the inside of the buildings and in some cases grant funding. We also had to address maintenance backlog which we might have otherwise deferred.”

The council worked with Locality and the Northamptonshire Social Enterprise Development Agency and initial funding for the project was provided by Locality’s Asset Transfer Unit and the council.

“Local authorities can expect to make capital savings and reductions in repair an maintenance cost,” said Locality’s Naylor. “We recommend they start by developing a strategy. There are a range of mechanisms to be used which include asset transfer, the new right to bid, compulsory purchase for communities, right to reclaim land and meanwhile use.”

Locality has just closed applications to its multiple asset transfer programme in which it will work with five councils who are looking to transfer a number of properties over to the community. It expects to announce the five successful councils in the next couple of weeks.