Westgate Town Council is on the move

A new base for Westgate Town Council

Westgate-on-Sea Town Council is moving from their current premises at 11 Ethelbert Square to a new larger premises at 78 St Mildred’s Road, on July 1.

The move is to allow the council to expand its services, open for longer, have a more accessible location and provide additional community space.

The new space, formerly Birchington Brides, is almost double the size of the old premises. As well as being able to open longer hours each day, the new space will also house a food bank, tourist information point, ticket office and recycling location.

Moving to St Mildred’s Road  also allows the council to keep all meetings in-house rather than paying to hold them in other locations. This will provide a saving in their annual budget.

It is also hoped the new space will be a host location to community-based services and classes, building on the success of schemes such as CPR and defib classes and bumblebee wildlife training.

Westgate-on-Sea Town Council is keen to start developing its own revenue streams to be able to put money back into community projects. It hopes to help achieve this by renting out the new space and allowing it to be used privately for exhibitions, events, gallery space, launches and community events which will not affect the day to day running of the council offices but will bring in additional revenue.

The council says the move will not result in any additional costs to residents.

Chairperson Martyn Pennington said, “The new premises not only offers good value for money but will be open to all the community as a facility”.