Funding talks over prison garden

Councillors are being urged to spend £50,000 to save a Shrewsbury prison garden, so that the community can use and enjoy it.

Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council (SABC) is being asked to buy the garden, close to Shrewsbury’s Dana prison, after it was saved from auction.

The garden was due to be auctioned in London by the National Offender Management Service, on behalf of the prison, until borough MP Daniel Kawczynski intervened in a bid to save it.

Now council members are being asked to approve £50,000 be spent to buy the garden, maintain it and improve it after the sellers agreed to discuss a deal with the council over the purchase.

Money to buy the 0.36-acre site, which includes a section of the River Severn, would come from capital funds.

Leader of the council Peter Nutting will propose the recommendations when councillors meet on Monday.

He said no decision had been made on the future of the land, but it would be kept as open space, possibly as a small “pocket park” for people to relax, or children to play, or as an allotment.

“No decision has been made and if somebody comes up with a better idea we would listen to that,” he said. “We are looking for this land for open space, with no sort of development whatsoever.”

A report to councillors ahead of the meeting recommends the purchase, saying: “That £50,000 be allocated from capital receipts for the purchase, maintenance and improvement of the land into a pocket garden in 2008/9 and the land and maintenance responsibility transfers to Shrewsbury Town Council on its establishment.”

By John Kirk