You are invited to the Annual General Meeting of Staveley Community Trust - the community benefit society - that hoped to secure the Abbey site and develop the New Abbey
Thursday, 17 October at 5 pm
at Staveley Institute
Members and all those who have showed an interest are invited to attend.
In 2020 the Abbey Care Home closed its doors for the last time and the residents left for good. Local people objected: they presented a 2000 strong petition. It was their Abbey, it had always been their safe future if things got tough. Cumbria CC closed it anyway.
We produced an innovative, costed proposal that matched local needs. It was so exciting we were offered a £260,000 grant to prepare for the build and make our case even stronger. We created Staveley Community Trust (a Community Benefit Society) to allow us to acquire the Abbey site.
Hugh Tomlinson, CEO Age UK Southlakeland agreed with us that the proposal ‘demonstrates perfectly what can be achieved in an active Civil Society and your template project could certainly be duplicated across the country.’
Read more about what he said about us.
As of 1st April the Abbey Care Home site transferred to Westmorland and Furness Council, who promise to revisit the decision made by Cumbria County Council to sell the building to the highest bidder.
Following, an asset review the council decided that they would sell the building to a Registered Provider (RP) of affordable houses. This decision ignored the wishes of our community as expressed in their consultation or their espoused commitment to ‘working closely with residents and businesses to help them to shape their own destiny and thrive.’ Westmorland and Furness Priorities 2023.
At the moment, we cannot envisage how the community can acquire the Abbey Site for the community. The work of Staveley Community Trust has been put on hold. It remains a community benefit society and will continue to be available to meet it’s aims as stated in the society’s rules.
Where we are now!
Our Abbey was to be sold by formal tender. This means that on 19 January 2023, there should have been a new owner agreed. But it didn’t happen. The new local authority Westmorland and Furness Council have put the disposal is on hold.
AT the moment they are working with local register providers of social housing. They have invited us to be part of that discussion and we hope we can work with them to get as near as possible to the community vision.
This means that we can not see a way that we’ll be in a position to purchase The Abbey in the near future.
Staveley Community Trust (SCT) was set up to develop the New Abbey on behalf of the community. Anyone can be a member and be part of this exciting new project.
Our proposal is for 16 extra-care apartments and a hub where you can meet up with friends, have a meal and get support if you need it.