Listed Hastings town centre property to be redeveloped to create new 'energy efficent' housing

On Monday (April 3), Hastings Borough Council cabinet members formally gave their support to the Town Living Project — a Town Deal funded scheme which seeks to create high-quality, energy efficient and affordable housing within the town centre.

The first phase of this project, which needs to be signed off in a full council vote before progressing, revolves around plans to convert a Grade II listed and council-owned property in Wellington Square into five new homes.

Cllr Maya Evans, Labour cabinet member for housing, said: “This project ticks the two main priorities for the council at the moment, which is the climate crisis and also the housing crisis.”

She added: “Fifty per cent of our carbon comes from housing, so there is a massive need to retrofit every building, especially the old ones such as the one in Wellington Square we are going to be looking at.

“This is money that we potentially have from the government to do this much-needed work.”

Cllr Evans said this work would include repairing and upgrading the fabric of the building, introducing internal wall linings and adding insulation, as well introducing energy efficient lighting, air source heat pumps and PV solar panels.

The building to be converted is currently used as temporary accommodation (i.e. emergency housing for homeless residents). This led to some criticism from ward councillor Claire Carr (Green), who said the council had failed to properly inform the building’s current occupants of the project.

Cllr Carr also raised some concerns about the loss of temporary accommodation from the council’s books given the well-documented financial costs of this sort of housing.

In response to this criticism, officers said they would review their communications plan to ensure residents were well informed as the project progresses.

However, it was also stressed that the project was still some way off and it was hoped that those currently living in the building would be in permanent accommodation long before works began.

The overall project has already been awarded £1,037,615 from the Hastings Town Fund Programme. Of this, £794,000 is currently expected to be used in the renovation and conversion of the Wellington Square property, subject to full council approval.