THE flagship Glass Works development will not make the profit for the council initially intended, a meeting was told this week.
The redevelopment of the town centre is being paid for by Barnsley Council and is costing £180m.
A meeting of the council’s scrutiny board, which monitors the authority’s performance, was told this week by financial officer Neil Copley that the development had been expected to generate a profit to the council.
But he confirmed this would now not be the case.
When asked by Coun Wayne Johnson about the reliability of earlier financial forecasts, Mr Copley admitted that figures suggesting a small return had been reversed.
He said there has been an increase in building costs, funded through borrowing, and the income return from rents and rates was not going to be as high as first anticipated three years ago. But David Shepherd, the council’s director for economic regeneration, said leases would provide income to cover the costs of the work.
He said: “We are quite pleased in terms of the deals we have done so far. We need to make sure we get the best deal for Barnsley. There will be further (tenant) announcements to come.
“We need to make sure we are doing that on a feasible basis, rental incomes to support the overall scheme and to ensure we have got enough to cover the cost of running the scheme.”
Councillors were told by executive director Matt Gladstone that footfall was up by 11 per cent on last year.
Coun Roy Miller said: “This council made a brave decision. We have delivered on our promises. We have opened a new market. I have been in the town centre and it is busy.
“I spoke to four traders and they said they had never done as good.
“We have to get people to use the town centre. Barnsley is set in its ways, it likes its market and we have kept that market. We are moving forward and we will keep the town centre going.”
Councillors were told economic uncertainty remained the biggest worry over the next 12 months, but more was being done particularly around leisure activities to attract people to the town.
Talks are ongoing with The Civic to see how it could be used to help achieve this, and better access to transport is also being examined.
