Alderley Edge Parish Council is proceeding with essential structural works at the Festival Hall and will be meeting shortly to discuss the refurbishment of the main Hall.
With building work expected to start in May, after the Alderley Edge Festival, to create a new medical centre at the front of the Festival Hall, the Parish Council plans to refurbish and upgrade the main Hall.
Their aim is to provide a modern, flexible venue which can be used by residents and attract a wider market, on a commercial basis.
The initial work will involve creating a new entrance to the Hall so that it can continue to be used during the construction of the medical centre, which is expected to take eight to nine months to complete - so the work will all be finished in time for the 2014 Alderley Edge Festival.
Cllr Melanie Connor provided an update regarding the management of the Festival Hall at this month's Parish Council meeting.
She informed councillors that the Festival Hall up until Monday 11th March had taken £53,270, in bookings and from bar sales, and they are hoping that by the end of March to have taken £56,745. This would represent a 29.5% increase on the £40,000 taken during the previous financial year.
During the same period events held at the Festival Hall have raised £23,000 for various charities.
Cllr Connor said "We now have a very difficult time of course while we wait for what happens with the new medical centre and entrance for the hall. We have very good bookings for the next few months but obviously we're going to lose toilets, we're going to lose an entrance. So figures we're going to put forward for the next six months are very shaky.
"The people we have spoken to who have general things downstairs, like the dogs, are happy to come whatever building work is going on but it's the larger functions we might have some problems with."
Cllr Connor added "We've actually had some very bad structural problems, we've got damp coming in at the back, where the History Society was, so we're having to have the roof fixed in the corner and the boiler at the back has broken.
"We were actually given a building in such disrepair that we should have just knocked it all down and start again."
Cllr Connor continued "We are having a meeting soon to discuss points to put forward for the refurbishment of the hall. We know we've got quite a lot of money to play with but we want to see it spent wisely and therefore we need the Parish Council to be in contact and to discuss the new entrance."
Cllr Mike Williamson said "There is an outstanding application for a new entrance which was approved when the new medical centre was approved but that's never really achieved what our aspiration was for a new entrance to the side of the hall so yes we need to consider that."
Cllr Frank Keegan commented "The fabric of the hall was not in a great state which is exactly why we got a dowry of £450,000, mixed between capital and revenue, to cover it and we were the only parish which got the given the dowry.
"So given we were going to do a lot of it up in any case we knew there was not a great deal of worry about what was already here as we were always going to have to refurbish it."
Cllr Melanie Connor responded "We need to address issues because people do complain when there is not hot water in the toilets and if we are taking a lot of money for the rental of the hall the least we can have is hot water in the toilets."
Cllr Williamson agreed "We need to press on and get these things fixed."
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It is also worth noting that the figure reported by the Parish Council as "Festival Hall Revenue" each year is somewhat misleading because it includes £15,000 of the dowry.