RCS donates to Landgate

In March of this year Rother District Council agreed at its Cabinet Meeting to “carry out urgent works to the Landgate, Rye, up to £74,000, to be met from the Repairs and Renewals Earmarked Reserves and to include a contribution of at least £7,000 from local stakeholders including Rye Town Council and continue negotiations with local stakeholders to secure a long-term solution” as it accepted that it has a duty to look after its heritage assets. Rye Town Council has agreed to underwrite the contribution of £7,000 and the Rye Fund has recently agreed to find £3,000 towards this figure.
At the last Executive Meeting, it was agreed that Rye Conservation Society(RCS) would guarantee a further £1,000 towards the overall figure that Rye will need to find. This will come from its financial reserves, which have been boosted by a recent bequest from a previous Chairman, the late Paul Blomfield. As part of the repair works, RCS will look to ensure that a separate electrical supply will be maintained to the clock and to the external floodlights together with safe access to the clock. This is to allow for separate projects to repair and maintain the clock as well as to reintroduce the floodlighting, to be taken forward without additional future cost.
 

Photo: Julian Luckett

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3 COMMENTS

  1. It is wonderful that Rother has now agreed to put money towards repairs and renewals with Rye Town Council underwriting the required £7000. A big thank you to Rye Fund for reducing this figure by contributing £3000. The action group who recently formed and brought Rother to the table with the support of the Conservation Society (CS) are also thankful for the £1000 from CS towards the overall figure that Rye needs to find. What I personally am not clear about is if that money can be used as part of the £7000 for the general repairs or if it is to go towards the clock and electric supply to operate it.
    I would think that the clock repairs will be a lot more than £1000 and I don’t think Rother intends to use their money towards it. I would also like to mention that the £74,000 do not include a roof which seems to me an oversight as any repairs surely need to be protected from new decay by a roof and that includes any work on the clock.
    While we are all glad that something is being done I would have thought a roof is paramount. However, there is a group of all stakeholders in the making, headed by the new mayor and I will suggest we try to raise money for the roof.
    Heidi Foster

  2. My apologies, We could have been a bit clearer. The Conservation Society is offering £1000 to the Rye Town Council without conditions, but we feel any work that is done should enable future work to be carried out to get the clock going and to ensure safe access. It is likely that there will need to be a town appeal for funds for the clock which I would support.

  3. Interesting to compare this news with the interview in August 2016 (on this site) with Paul Osborne, leader of RDC, to discover exactly how little, or nothing, has happened in nearly 2 years. RDC couldn’t even get the uplighters fixed.
    [Note: this comment has been slightly edited to comply with our Comments Policy]

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