Plan to maintain youth services after club closure

The town council said the youth centre, which is due to close this month, needed a building survey

Plans are being developed to save youth services in a Somerset town after it was announced that the youth centre is to close later this month.

Chard Town Council has now agreed to spend up to £10,000 on short-term youth provision for the summer holidays and to continue to look into what it could provide on a longer-term basis.

But the summer programme may not be able to use the youth centre building, which has been operating for more than 70 years, because the council said a condition survey of the building needed to be carried out.

In May, the charity which currently runs Chard Youth Centre, said it was no longer financially sustainable.

The building started being used as a youth centre in 1949

The trustees of Chard Area Youth Committee said it was a "heart-wrenching" decision to potentially close the centre which started operating for local young people in 1949.

The centre will currently hold its final youth sessions on Friday 18 July.