£45k flower bill after closure
UP TO £45,000 a year will be spent on buying in plants and flowers after a council shut its own nursery in budget cuts.
Stoke-on-Trent City Council's state-of-the-art Greenhouse 2000 facility closed in October and is currently for sale with a price tag of up to £1 million.
The authority now expects to spend £45,000 a year buying bedding plants from other companies and has spent £20,913 making two nursery workers redundant.
Officers say they have not yet estimated how much will be spent securing the building while it remains empty.
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The Festival Park nursery grew and sold thousands of flowers each year to businesses and neighbouring councils, as well as supplying plants for the council's own floral displays.
Cabinet members were told the centre was set to make a profit of £61,000 before they voted for its closure last year, but the authority says the profit was based on budget cuts and the centre had been running at a substantial loss.
Figures show Greenhouse 2000 lost £513,421 between 2007/08 and 2011/12, an average of £102,600 a year.
Losses were reduced from £145,735 in 2010/11 to £24,179 in 2011/12 as the council significantly scaled back its spending on plants and flowers.
The council says it would have had to spend £781,000 upgrading facilities over the coming years in order to keep the centre running.
Ian Tamburello, interim strategic manager of environment, said: "The Greenhouse has made losses in previous years. The marginal profit of £60,000 was for this financial year and was based on efficiency measures. With the pressures facing local authorities, this income stream could not be guaranteed."
Sylvia Arnold, aged 55, of Meir, said: "It's a shame they aren't spending money on flowers because it helps people feel a bit of pride in the area.
"I dread to think what people think when they're driving in, but if it's costing that much money there isn't a choice."
All contracts with businesses and other councils were honoured, meaning no refunds had to be handed out because of the closure. Greenhouse 2000 also provided services for weddings, birthdays, anniversaries and funerals, as well as some corporate contracts for offices and showrooms.
The city council is scaling back its funding for floral displays. The budget has been more than halved over two years and perennial plants which need less upkeep are replacing bedding plants.
Comments
by callum16
Sunday, January 13 2013, 7:43PM
“thanks for your support”
by HigginsIND
Sunday, January 13 2013, 2:22AM
“Greenhouse2000 was a well respected, award winning (RHS Tatton Park), profit making enterprise. I ran a petition to save it from closure but as always a decision is already made before it even comes up for discusion.
Greenhouse2000 was a real gem for the council, but sadly no more. £61k profit now turned into £45k cost. That's a total loss of £106,000 (plus nearly £21k in redundancy payments plus unkown security costs). Furthermore, yet again our elected council made the desicion to 'sell' land without any prospective buyer. This in the same finacial year that our elected council decided to protect the £130k position of Lord Mayor (appointed from the council) and decided to grant themselves a pay rise; self preservation society anyone?
If I had a spare £1m to invest I would certainly buy Greenhouse2000 and re-employ the same staff that made it an award winning nursery, it would take less than 17 years to make my money back.
It is an utter disgrace that this council is allowed to continue with such mind blowing finacial misjudgements. Pevez especially is an absolute embarrasment. I hope people make their feelings known come the next round of council elections.”
by callum16
Saturday, January 12 2013, 6:17PM
“they shut a PROFIT making department {not running at a loss} and have to pay someone else to now grow their plants that really makes sense, does the brewery saying come to mind”
by callum16
Saturday, January 12 2013, 9:26AM
“One thing the greenhouse is not up for sale because they plan to put a road though it from wolstanton.And them figues are wrong to as they have made it look like that so they could shut it.The greenhouse was growing at a rapaid rate reguarding the cuts to the buget.I truly hate stoke on trent city council that is why i left my job and the city.All they do is lie through there teeth to get what ever they want.”