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Housing | News
Council’s £5m property deal
ALMOST £5million of tax-payers’ money has been spent on 21 prop- erties that Maidstone Borough Council (MBC) hopes to let at commercial rents, Downs Mail can reveal.
The authority has voted to ac-
quire 14 new apartments at Spring- field, Maidstone, for £3,280,000, as well as two pairs of semis and a three-house
terrace at Russet
Grove, Marden, for £1,710,000. On Monday, October 5, the council voted through the pur- chases, despite opposition from the Conservative and Independent Maidstone members. The ruling Lib Dem/Labour/In- dependent coalition secured vic- tory by five votes, 26 to 21. MBC hopes the combined rentals will come to about £200,000. But one MBC insider, who doubts the “wisdom” of buying the Spring- field properties, said: “With the market being flooded with apart- ments in the town centre, they won’t get much capital value ap- preciation.” Tories were “outraged” by the alleged plan to “to buy entire hous- ing blocks to profiteer from exorbi- tant rents in behind-the-scenes deals with developers”. Park Wood member Cllr Matt Burton said: “The council’s focus on housing should be all about en-
abling social and affordable prop- erties and delivering added value to Maidstone residents, not bulk- buying
properties before they
come to market to turn a profit.” Conservative group leader John
Perry said such deals meet none of the social housing needs. Independent Cllr Eddie Powell (pictured), who voted against the purchases, said: “Surely, a council buying properties should be doing so for local people to rent at hous- ing association rates. Instead, it will be the commercial market rate. “You’d think that would be the Labour Party position but they chose to stick by their coalition partners. It was a political move and not necessarily good for local people.”
Parish ‘will ght hard’
Continued from page one Cllr Britt added: “Justifying that junction would require 10,000 new homes and a similar and unrealis- tic number of jobs to be created, but MBC seems undeterred and is clearly pushing for the bigger de- velopment, also entangling our neighbouring parish of Charing and Ashford borough. “If that isn’t in MBC’s thinking, let’s hear its leaders deny it. “If our findings are correct and
MBC thinks it has found the ‘line of least resistance’ ... they are mis- taken: the parish council will fight hard and ally with protest groups inside and outside its area. “We haven’t forgotten that MBC chose not to consult the parish council about Lenham Heath ... In- stead, members and the commu- nity were left to hear about it via the media, which is unacceptable.”
MBC says the Lenham Heath proposal is one of 330 sites put for- ward in last year’s “Call For Sites” exercise, as part of the initial stage of the review of the 2017 Local Plan. Philip Coyne, MBC’s interim di- rector of the Local Plan Review, said: “Work is ongoing in relation into which of these sites will con- tribute to the preferred spatial strategy as part of Maidstone’s cur- rent Local Plan Review.
“Whilst this strategy will be sub- ject to public consultation in De- cember, no final decisions have yet been taken and it would therefore be inappropriate to comment.” ABC refused to be drawn on its
involvement other than to say it is aware of MBC’s “search for sites and a potential development in Lenham”. l See “The Future of Maidstone” supplement inside.
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