OKEHAMPTON seems certain to lose the ?Scrap Store? recycling facility which has played a key role in supporting countless arts and community groups in the area over the last three years.
Arts Works Plus was set up by Okehampton man Steve Newton, an arts worker who visits schools and other groups holding creative arts sessions.
As part of this work, Steve set up the Scrap Store on Okehampton?s Exeter Road industrial estate three years ago as a training and play resource centre to promote the creative recycling of safe waste and surplus materials.
The treasure trove of discarded items are carefully sorted by Steve and displayed at the Scrap Store, where they became available to schools, groups, artists, families and individuals to use for any creative work.
The large scrap room has been a source for the materials used in many of the floats and costumes at Okehampton Carnival in recent years.
But Steve says that without outside funding the Scrap Store is too expensive to continue running.
He said: ?I can?t do it for love anymore, I can?t keep paying the bills and the project will have to close at the end of October, but I am hoping somebody might be able to help keep it in the community.?
Steve said people came from as far away as Barnstaple and Launceston to pick up recycled art and craft materials, including card, paper, fabrics and plastic containers at the store.
Steve said he set up the project with the aim of encouraging an environmental awareness among the local community. By working with industry, a vast array of materials, often destined for the landfill site, had been regularly collected, turning what might be regarded as scrap into useful materials.
Steve said the store was, if anything, more popular now, than when it first opened, but without funding help it was becoming impossible to keep it viable.
He was able to extend the project to provide advice and training in the use of recycled materials and workshops and imaginative art and craft sessions organised for schools and groups.
Unless alternative accommodation can be found, or another body is prepared to come to the rescue, the centre will be lost to Okehampton and the surrounding area.
A Scrap Store facility recently opened in Tavistock at the Molly Owen Centre in Pixon Lane. Steve said if the store was forced to close he hoped facilities like the one in Tavistock would be able to take much of the remaining materials off his hands.
Visitors to the centre can still take away a carrier bag filled with discarded items for just £1.
Steve is keen to see the stock of goods in store used up as much as possible.
The centre is open to visitors on Sundays, from 9am to 5pm, Tuesday and Fridays, 7pm to 10pm, or at any other time by arrangement with Steve who can be contacted on 01837 53648.