50 signatures reached
To: The Church of England
Save Somerville Hall
To stop St Chads Church demolishing Somerville Hall, our local community hall and property developing x5 nonaffordable (full market price) houses. This is to fund the renovation of their facilities at their church St Chads in Chadwell Heath which is over a mile away.
Why is this important?
We have already lost the Pre School which ran for 50+ years due to St Chads Church closing the hall. Also, our Guides, Karate Group and other functions/groups have all ceased because of their decision to close Somerville Hall. Somerville Hall also has a Covenant dating back to when the land was given to the church and the council in 1957. This was to protect the land from any development that didn’t facilitate the needs of the local community.
In 2019 it was also awarded an Asset of Community Value listing by Redbridge Council. This essentially saves buildings that are proven to perform a unique service when there are no other places locally that can perform that task. It is in a nutshell a asset to the community. It says exactly what it does on the tin! It was a valuable resource that has been taken away from us and will remain so if St Chads Church isn’t made to look at its conscience and reopen it for our community.
Contrary to some reports, the hall is not derelict. It is not pretty, and at the moment could be tarted up with a lick of paint and some tender loving care. Our campaigners have even offered our services to the Church to help them in cleaning up the Hall. However, these offers of help have fallen on deaf ears. Just to clarify, at the time of closure the hall had been awarded and passed an Ofsted inspection. So very far from derelict.
Up until recently our plan was to petition The Church of England to just re open the hall and for it to be used as before by our community. But as of the beginning of May the Church Reverend has lodged an Appeal to overturn Redbridge Councils decision. We were hoping the Church would see sense about this as we need precious community space due to this Covid Crisis. However, the Church is still pursuing this property development cash raiser. Please help us and sign our petition.
