We did seek to have a piece of land withdrawn from auction to give us time to build up a scheme and see if we could buy it privately, but that was turned down by the vendor.
We have now gone through Herefordshire Council’s asset register to identify which pieces might provide us with a site. We have a meeting set up with the council in mid October to discuss these sites, with the hope that we can in due course discuss the possibility of acquiring one for a potential project.
Meanwhile a team of members have been looking at under used properties in the historic centre of the city with a view to undertaking more work on ownership and development conundra in terms, for example, of listed building issues with a view to identifying a building for which we could apply for funds under Architectural Heritage Funding to carry out detailed work on possible acquisition and a scheme.
We have also been using google earth to identify derelict/empty plots of land in Hereford and members are now researching ownership and other issues concerning those plots which appear suitable for a possible CLT scheme from a brief inspection on the ground.
We will also be having discussions with SHYPP (recently renamed Citizen Young People), the preventing homeless arm of what was Kemble Housing Association, to see if we might be able to generate a scheme where young people could help build their own homes, possibly meshing with other young people in Hereford keen to do the same thing.