Published: Thursday, 28th January, 2010 10:18am

It's the end of the Rainbow

by Fiona Howard

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Not enough money to keep village centre viable

THERE is no gold at the end of the Rainbow - just a touch of sadness at the close of an era.

A public meeting in Kilcreggan's dilapidated Rainbow Centre, right, discussed the future of the old building and decided . . . to do nothing.

Only around 15 members of the public turned out to discuss the possibilities for the building, which was once the village school before becoming a community centre, and they heard that it would have to bring in a minimum of £250 a month to have the slightest chance of survival.

The meeting was called by Kilcreggan man Malcolm Brown when he heard there was a proposal to hand the centre back to Argyll and Bute Council.

Councillor Danny Kelly told the meeting that the previous management committee's decision to hand the centre back had been taken reluctantly after the central heating boiler was pronounced irreparable. In addition, there were no longer any groups using the centre.

Mr Brown said the issue was whether or not it was felt that the community could support two halls, the Rainbow Centre and Cove Burgh Hall, especially when there are a number of other places where meetings can be held, including the hotel, the Sailing Club and the Scout Hall.

The meeting heard that when the community took over Cove Burgh Hall there had been a grant of £50,000 to begin the restoration work but that there was no money available any more. If the decision was to continue with the Rainbow Centre all restoration money would have to be raised by the management group.

Mr Brown told the group the cost of a new boiler would be in the region of £2,000. The bank account had a mere £8 left in it, and all the users had left, so there was no income. The cost of redecorating was estimated at a minimum of £500 just to make the hall presentable and a minimum of £3,000 a year would have to be raised to just carry on, with additional money for repairs and maintenance added to that.

This means that if the rent was set at £7 per hour the hall would need a minimum of five two hour lets each week.

The last users, the karate club and the playgroup, have found meeting places elsewhere and Mr Brown commented: "If there was any interested potential users in the area they would be represented here tonight but I don't see any."

The problem of getting enough lets would be further exacerbated by the fact that most groups only meet for half the year either in summer or winter and Mr Brown commented: "The crux of the problem is would we really have enough to provide the £3,000 per annum income that would be needed?"

Helen Evans told the meeting she had been a member of the original group which ran the centre successfully for nearly 15 years after the council had closed the centre down.

They had received £5,000 from Dulux to pay for decorating and there had been a lot of support from the community.

However, at that time the backbone of the centre had been the toddler group and Mrs Evans said: "There would be no point continuing unless you were sure the toddler group would come back."

Councillor Kelly reminded the group that at that time the Burgh Hall was in a run down state and was being run by the council but that things were different now.

Richard Reeve, one of the directors of the Burgh Hall, told the meeting that they had looked at taking on the Rainbow Centre as well as the hall and perhaps establishing the village library there as long ago as 2002 and had looked at it on a number of occasions since.

However they decided that "rather than make a large gamble" they had decided to stick with the Burgh Hall alone.

He also warned that the Burgh Hall group had recently had to spend a lot of time and money meeting new fire regulations and that that would be a major cost for anyone taking on the Rainbow Centre.

Local artist Christine Borland asked if the council would rent the building to something like a group of artists to use for studios but was told that the council would not be likely to do that.

If they took the hall back they would make it watertight and seal it up. The grounds would be tidied and a buyer sought.

The discussion continued but finally agreed that there was not enough support to make the project viable and it was agreed that no further action would be taken and the hall would be handed back to the council "with regret".