Frome Saxonvale: Regeneration site may be sold off to balance books

Artist's impression of the Mayday Saxonvale proposals for the site, which include a lido

A major Somerset regeneration site could soon be sold off as the unitary authority seeks to balance its books.

Somerset Council declared a "financial emergency" in November 2023 and has been working to reduce a projected overspend of £18m next year.

Significant amounts of its existing land, property assets and commercial investments could be sold off.

Councillors have now said this could include the Saxonvale site in Frome town centre to help save £20m.

The council has around 1,300 individual land and property assets, along with a large number of much smaller parcels of utility land.

A large amount of these assets cannot easily be sold off since they deliver statutory services - such as schools and libraries - or are protected by legal conditions which make their sale unviable.

The council's chief financial officer, Jason Vaughan, revealed in December 2023 that 16 sites had been sold in the financial year to date, and a further 74 sites had been identified as surplus and were in the process of being sold off.

More than 200 supporters gathered at the Saxonvale site in 2023 to oppose plans by Acorn Property Group to regenerate the area

Oliver Woodhams, the council's service director for strategic asset management, told the authority's corporate and resources scrutiny committee in Taunton on January 4 that asset sales in the current financial year had generated £4.7m of income for the council, with a further £2.9m expected by the end of the financial year.

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An additional £8.5m of assets could be sold off by April 2025 - taking a total of £16.5m off the council's projected budget gap, said the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).

"With our larger brownfield sites, we will be preparing parcels of those to be sold for regeneration efforts, such as Firepool and Saxonvale," he added.

Acorn Property Group's rival plans for Saxonvale were quashed by the High Court in October 2023

Councillor Shane Collins, who represents the Frome East division, claimed that the council was already in the process of selling the Saxonvale site to Mayday Saxonvale after the rivalling Acorn bid to develop the site was quashed by the High Court in October 2023.

"For councillors in Frome, we would really like an update on what's happening. It's been sitting there for 20 years," he said.

Mayday Saxonvale director Paul Oster said, after the meeting: "We are currently in discussions with Somerset Council regarding the Saxonvale site and are confident that the right decision will be made in due course."