A £5,000 marketing campaign is to be employed to drive forward the redevelopment of a historic town centre site in Okehampton. The Old Mill site, with its listed former mill chimney stack, was bought by West Devon Borough Council in 2000, with the intention it should benefit the community ? there is a restricted covenant on the land to this purpose. The council has created a landscaped path and cycle way along the edge of the site, But the rest of the site, which is composed of the chimney stack and a collection of derelict industrial buildings, remains unused. John Lewis, the borough?s regeneration officer, told Monday?s meeting of the council?s environment and community committee that a ?task and finish group? had been set up to investigate the options for progressing the development of the site. They had come up with four possible ways forward: l To do nothing, in which case the site will deteriorate further l To sell it, which would ?almost certainly? result in the loss of the anticipated community benefit l To select an option from the existing expressions of interest l To market the site, which could bring forward further expressions of interest, including ?high quality, imaginative projects?. The group had decided marketing the site was the way forward, said Mr Lewis. ?What we really want to do is really make sure we have cast the net wide enough and make sure the projects we?ve been looking to go with on that site are the best quality projects in the area.? Mr Lewis said the present expressions of interest, which included a new library, an arts centre, a cinema venue, a heritage centre and a training centre, would still be considered, along with any other projects which came forward as a result of the marketing campaign. Cllr James McInnes, chairman of the task and finish group which had investigated the Old Mill site, said he was ?very concerned? there should be a strategic overview of the site. He said: ?We mustn?t feel we must make a decision for the sake of it. This is the last open space in Okehampton for the people of Okehampton and we must be very careful that the site is very much honed in on them.? Cllr McInnes said he still favoured the idea of a library on the site. The committee agreed £5,000 should be set aside for marketing the site ? and that the existing parties who have already expressed an interest in the Old Mill should be given full consideration before a final developer was chosen.
