15th May 2018

The permanent home for the Ann Letitia Russell here is a little update. Me and Jeff Jackson our Chairman met with the current building owner a few months back to discus our plans and to start to negotiate a purchase price for the building, after a few months of long and hard negotiations we have agreed a discounted purchase price of £75,000 and we also now have a price of just over £200,000 to carryout all the required building works, this includes the replacement of the building front, cutting out and removel of part of the 1st floor to create a viewing balcony, the installation of a lift yo give wheelchair access to the 1st floor level, the installation of a rear fire exit, the installation of toilets including a disabled accessible toilet, the installation of a electrical system with renewable energy sources, a security and fire detection system and all the other building work required.

We are now working on the planning application and also working on the long and hard funding applications for funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund and from local Businesses.

Hopeful we will have more of an update with some good news soon.

 

24th March 2018

Last Friday Jeff Jackson and Rob Baines met with the current owner of 42 Adelaide Street the building the group is proposing to convert in to a museum to house the Ann Letitia Russell. The meeting was very successful, and the owner has agreed a discounted sale price of the building to The Ann Letitia Russell Rescue Group.

We are now waiting for the current owner to send us a letter confirming the price and that he is willing to hold of on any sale of the building until we have funding in place.

Once we have received the letter we can then move forward and start to secure a permanent home for The Ann Letitia Russell.

Our next step would be to apply for a small funding award to carry out the feasibility study that would consist of applying for change of use planning permission to change the building from Part A, A1 Retail to Part D, D1 Non-residential institutions.

Then if the change of use is granted then the next process of applications can take place in appling to the Lottery Heritage fund and local businesses for funding to purchase the building and funding to carryout the necessary works required.