Salvation for town's blot on the landscape (From Gazette & Herald)

Salvation for town's blot on the landscape

AN EYESORE building has been given a smart new look and saved for use by charitable groups working to benefit the Ryedale community.

The Salvation Army has invested more than £10,000 to refurbish its building in Church Street, Norton, which has been flooded twice, has been standing empty for nearly five years and has fallen into disrepair.

The organisation has replaced windows, repaired the roof, laid new flooring, redecorated it internally and externally and taken measures to move on troublesome pigeons.

It has rejected a number of offers from businesses who want to occupy the building, which is more than a century old, because they want it to be used for the good of the community.

Ian Beecham, of the Malton corps of the Salvation Army, said: "It's been empty for about five years. We've been conscious for a lot of that time that it needed tidying up, but it's one of those things where we couldn't paint it without making repairs and it was quite a major job. One of the problems we have is with pigeons out the back causing damage. We're trying to deal with it sensitively."

The building is the former Stable Lad's Club and Griffin pub, and was bought more than 10 years ago and opened as a young people's activity centre.

Mr Beecham said the organisation was finalising plans for a charity to move into the building.

"We hope to have it occupied later in the year. We are optimistic that it'll be another charity pursuing the sort of things we do. We can't say which one it is yet because we're still in negotiations. We are hoping that it's going to be used for the community," said Mr Beecham, who is also vice-chairman of Malton and Norton Chamber of Trade.

The back of the building was opened a year ago as a "dry bar", run by Ryedale's Youth Action officer PC Stewart Ashton, where young people meet and socialise.

"The Salvation Army is absolutely 110 per cent behind what the dry bar is doing and we also support the kind of work that the charity that is hopefully going to move in does," said Mr Beecham.

Updated: 12:04 Wednesday, January 05, 2005