On April 1, Y Gat, St Clears will be taken over by St Clears Town Council. The building, that previously housed West Wales Craft Centre, will now be run by the community, for the community, bringing new opportunities to the people of St Clears.
St Clears Town Council is now looking to the community to support them in developing the offering at the newly established community hub.
Following three years of discussions with Carmarthenshire County Council, the town council has been able to secure the asset transfer of the day-to-day management of Y Gat to the town council with the intention of developing it further through a community trust.
Alongside Landsker Business Solutions Ltd, a business consultancy based in Whitland, the town council are undertaking a community engagement exercise to explore the desires that the St Clears community has for the future use of the building. The intention of the exercise is to build on previous surveys and open days, undertaken in October 2022, to create more community involvement to determine appropriate branding for the project, to clarify the purpose and to explore the potential uses for community benefit – a building run by the community for the community.
A representative of St Clears Town Council stated:
“This will be a fresh start for the building and a chance to redefine and develop what is on offer there. The town council is keen to develop this project alongside the community so are now seeking their views to enable them to shape the project to what they feel is wanted or needed. The town council sees this as a long-term project to create a self-sustaining community facility that will create a legacy building that can serve the local community and visitors to the town for many years to come.”
In the coming weeks, Landsker will be active in the community engaging with residents and encouraging them to put forward their thoughts via online surveys and open days.
Colin Hughes, project lead from Landsker commented:
“We will be engaging with the St Clears community to collect as many views and ideas as possible with the aim of supporting the town council to make informed decisions for the future of the project. We would like to encourage the local community to engage with our activities by taking part in the survey and attending the upcoming open forum.”
The open session for the public will be held on Saturday, March 25 between 9.30am and 12.30pm at Y Gat with focus groups created to enable attendees to share their views.
Once the consultation exercise has been concluded a report, presented by the consultants, will be considered by the town council resulting in the gallery space being gradually made available for the uses identified by the community.