Hopes high after Drill Hall meeting

CAMPAIGNERS fighting to keep Great Yarmouth's Drill Hall open to sports groups were pleased with progress made at a meeting with Norfolk County Council this week.

Representatives of groups using the York Road hall met Alison MacPhail, area service manager for the county council children's services department, at Yarmouth library on Tuesday.

Mark Westgate, who runs a ladies basketball team at the hall, said the council would provide a breakdown of the costs involved with running and maintaining the hall so ways could be found to make the hall more self-financing.

Currently, the hall is running at a loss and the council had initially sought �1.7m of MyPlace lottery funding to divide the hall into smaller units to create a youth centre.

However, the proposals were ditched after the council failed in its funding bid in July. The announcement came a day after more than 30 members of Sports Club 88 held a protest.

Mr Westgate said once the financial information had been received the sports groups could look at ways of cutting existing costs and the cheapest way of carrying out improvements to the hall, particularly to the heating system and floor.

But he said there were no plans to increase the fees of the sports group members in the short term, at least until the breakdown of costs was known. Currently, Sports Club 88 pays �11 for a two hour session on four courts in the hall.

“It was a very positive and very frank meeting. It was about what we want to do and how we are going to do it,” Mr Westgate said.

Alison said: “We held the first working group meeting with representatives from the groups that use the York Road Drill Hall last night.

“The meeting provided the opportunity for members to share thoughts and ideas regarding the Drill Hall. Their contributions were very helpful and I look forward to continuing to work together with them.”

The next meeting between the drill hall groups and children's services is set to be held in November.