Basildon Council has revealed plans to refurbish Grade II listed Brooke House, opposite the Eastgate Centre, as part of its town centre regeneration strategy.
The authority said it is still drawing up proposals for the building - which will add to work to revamp neighbouring Freedom House and East Walk....Basildon would be it!
Andrew Gordon, Labour councillor for Lee Chapel North, grew up in the tower block. He admitted the building needs refurbishing - but said he hopes it will not come at the expense of current tenants.
Mr Gordon said: “We need to sit down with them as a council and find out what it is that they want from the refurbishment.
“It seems as though we are trying to gentrify Basildon, and when I speak to people living and working in the town centre about the regeneration plans for Basildon they seem to be worried about being priced out through rents.
“We can all agree that change needs to happen at Brooke House, but it has to be the right sort of changes.
“It is really important we don’t exclude anyone and consult with the residents.”If you change the housing, but not the residents, you know what you'll get?
Yup. That's right. You'll get Basildon.
2 comments:
Call it what it is - descumification.
In the late 1980s, a good friend of my was living in a council flat in Basildon.
It was so rough the council could not fill the flats, so a single male university graduate well paid and working on UK defence contracts was able to rent a 2 bed flat.
It did not last long. We were going camping and his car broke down so we took mine instead.
In the week we were away the the friendly neighbours not only managed to get the car going, they also managed to sell it.
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