Work begins on new community centre with Focus Consultants as project manager

New Community project in Lincolnshire with Focus

Work is now underway on building a new community centre in Lincolnshire village Mareham le Fen, which will replace a 100-year-old tin and timber hall.

Focus Consultants is project managing the scheme, having earlier supported the Village Hall Management Committee in securing a grant of just over £500,000 from The Big Lottery Fund. Other main funders include WREN, a not-for-profit grant-giving business, who donated £50,000, and Lindsey Action Zone.

The committee has raised further funds through community events and donations to cover the overall £800,000 cost of the project for the new multi-purpose building, which will serve the residents of Mareham le Fen, situated between Horncastle and Boston, as well as the surrounding parishes. 

Long-standing community member John Ellwood was given the honour of cutting the first sod. He was accompanied by pupils of Mareham Le Fen Church of England Primary School along with their headteacher Avril Moore.

Graham Beacham, chairman of Mareham le Fen Village Hall and Memorial Lawn Management Committee, said: “This is a great day. It’s so good to see the start of a new centre for the community. It has been quite a journey, but with the support of so many, success has been achieved.” 

Focus Consultants building surveyor Chris Smith, who grew up in the village and played a key role in helping to secure the Big Lottery Grant and in taking the project forward, said: “A new community building for Mareham le Fen is long overdue and I am delighted to have played a part in getting the scheme to where it is now, with a start on site.

“Focus is project managing the development and I am looking forward to seeing the building taking shape over the next few weeks and months.”

Local company Taylor Pearson has been contracted to carry out the building work, which is due to be completed in November 2017. The Boston office of Focus Consultants is handling the project management side of the scheme.

Additional funders who are supporting the building include Lincolnshire County Council, East Lindsey District Council, Garfield Weston Foundation, Trusthouse Charitable Foundation, Bernard Sunley Charitable Foundation and Lincolnshire Co-op Community Champions.

Focus, which has its headquarters in Nottingham and other offices in London, Leicester, and Aubourn in Lincolnshire, offers a range of services in funding and economic development, project management, sustainable development and building surveying.

Since 1994 Focus has also secured for clients more than £953 million of grants for projects and businesses across the UK and delivered more than £1.3 billion worth of projects and programmes – making it one of the most successful businesses of its kind in the country.

For more information, visit www.focus-consultants.co.uk

Press release issued by Nottingham based PR company Perfect 10 PR www.perfect10pr.co.uk

Focus Consultants provides the foundations for a new village hall

A Lincolnshire village is looking forward to building a new community centre after East Midlands-based Focus Consultants helped the parish council to secure funding for the scheme.

The Focus team worked with Heydour Parish Council to secure £458,133 funding from the Big Lottery Fund.

The money will allow the village to tear down the existing World War One officers’ mess hut and replace it with a modern and versatile community facility.

The new Heydour village hall will provide a local place for older residents to access cultural, health and social support and clubs whilst providing a base for activities for the whole community, especially children and young people.

Around 350 local people from Heydour, Aisby and Oasby, which are between Sleaford and Grantham, in Lincolnshire, are expected to use the new hall.

“The team at Focus Consultants is delighted to hear that funding has been granted from the National Lottery for this new community facility and that development can now begin,” said Karl Marriott, a partner at Focus.

“The original hut is believed to have been liberated from Belton Park Machine Gun Corp and relocated to Aisby in Heydour parish in 1922. Our consultants and surveyors worked with Heydour Parish Council to secure the funding which will now allow the village to realise its dream of a new and replacement community facility which can serve its needs in the 21st Century.”

The new hall will be built on the site of the original building and will include a large and flexible multi-use hall, a meeting room, storage facilities, kitchen, bar/server area and changing areas for events and outdoor sports.

WiFi and internet access will also be provided for residents, business users and local groups … opening up online facilities to the whole community.

Focus Consultants’ senior consultant Heather Frecklington, senior building surveyor James Baker, senior quantity surveyor Sean Smith and assistant quantity surveyor Will Morris provided funding and construction services and were instrumental in achieving funding success.

Norman Hatcliff, chair of Heydour Parish Hall Management Committee, said: “The new hall for Heydour will be a wonderful legacy for our community, our community’s children and the generations that follow.”

The total cost of the scheme is almost £750,000.

Focus Consultants, based at Phoenix Business Park, Nottingham, and with offices at Endeavour Park, Boston, Princess Road East, Leicester, Aubourn, Lincoln, and Holborn, London, specialises in creative approaches to securing funding packages and delivering high quality projects across the UK.

Since its creation in 1994, Focus has secured over £800 million of grant assistance, and delivered more than £1 billion of projects and programmes - including enterprise support, innovation, culture, health, regeneration, affordable homes and energy carbon sustainability projects.

www.focus-consultants.co.uk

Issued by Nottingham PR company Perfect 10 PR www.perfect10pr.co.uk