Powys town councillors have been set some homework – to think about how a community investment project could be set up and run

Rhayader Town Council has been considering setting up an organisation which could earn them an income to benefit the local area, for a long while.

At a recent meeting, members talked about their initial thoughts and ideas.

Rhayader Mayor Councillor Christian Walton said they needed a mechanism to encourage like-minded people that did not necessarily want to join the town council but want to drive large projects to help them.

He said the organisation would earn an income which could then be spent on local groups, helping to look after local facilities like parks and to drive big projects such as community energy generation.

“I have spoken to lots of people about it and there are like-minded people who would like to get involved and they have different skill sets,” he said.

Deputy Mayor Councillor James Stuart said he does see the need for such an organisation but he said similar organisations have been set up in the past and now some are dormant with a lot of money and some have changed direction.

He said: “My concern would be that we as a council want something to generate money and are we just risking this becoming another Transition Town project where nobody really wants to do something. I think we need an income stream not an organisation that could die a death in a few years.

“I think we would be better off owning the company and calling in experts when we need them. I think we would need to have a paid manager but part of their remit would be to apply for funding and create income.

“If we rely on volunteers there would be a risk of over burdening them because its always the same people on all the committees.”

Councillor Clare Evans said: “We don’t have a project yet. Could we have a community interest company as some sort of standing committee that we could use to try and get funding for and then that standing committee could become a company?”

Councillor Walton asked each of the councillors to ‘have a good long think about it before the next meetings and they will revisit the issue.”