Council keeps regeneration plans secret to avoid being forced to pay more

Nicholas Thomas, Local Democracy Reporter 

A committee says some regeneration projects in a Welsh city centre are being kept secret so the council is not forced to pay over the odds.

A scrutiny committee heard concerns the council’s plan for revitalising central Newport “lacks ambition”, after a report listed new busking spots and decorated empty shopfronts as successes.

Cllr Matthew Evans said he believed the council was “not setting strong enough targets” for regeneration, and also questioned how effective a plan to demolish the former WH Smith building on Commercial Street would be.

The council bought the building earlier this year and has proposed replacing it with a new public open space, in line with a wider desire to tackle empty shops.

But Cllr Evans said demolishing one building would be “nothing to celebrate” and could also be a “nightmare” project to complete.

“If you’re talking about demolishing a dozen buildings and creating space for projects or outdoor concerts, something like that, then that’s ambitious – we need a much stronger focus on big projects in the city centre,” he told senior officers at the committee meeting.

The council’s deputy leader, Cllr Deb Davies, said there was “an ambitious plan” for change, “but what we can’t do is talk about a lot of that plan”.

“It’s not just commercial sensitivity, but if you start casting your eye around and focusing on specific buildings or areas where you want to build, immediately investors [see] the council getting interested and it changes those costs, it changes those prices [because] property developers want to make a profit on the back of our plans.

“So a lot of what we do, a lot of intentions and ambitions, are not out in the public domain for that very reason.”

Cllr Davies said buying the former WH Smith building was “part of a larger masterplan” and the council administration has “an absolute intention to create a great sea change, to ensure we increase footfall [and] the ability of residents to work in the city centre”.

“But we can’t talk in the public domain of what those intentions are, without creating a risk in regard to property developers thinking they can actually take advantage of what our actual ambitions are,” she added.

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