Is it the end for the Newbury Retail Association?

Business Improvement District adoption could spell the end of the Newbury Retail Association

THE chairman of the Newbury Retail Association (NRA) has said there would be no need for the group to continue if a Business Improvement District (BID) is adopted by traders in the town.

Rate-paying businesses in Newbury town centre are currently being consulted on whether they want to form a BID, a defined area in a town in which businesses must pay between a one and five per cent levy, based on the rateable value of the size of their business.

If a BID, which could generate a possible £200,000 a year for town centre projects, is voted in by businesses next year then there would be no need for the NRA, according to its chairman, Brian Burgess.

At an NRA meeting at The Dolphin Hotel in Bartholomew Street, Newbury, on Tuesday, he said: “Obviously the BID is the most active thing in the town at the moment because it's being financed. “They will be the dominant force.

“Certainly I don't see a reason to keep the NRA unless it just lays dormant.”

The new centre manager for Parkway, Neil Carter, told the retailers at the meeting that the NRA's energy should be focused on the BID.

He said: “The BID is the be all and end all at the moment. I would say the most important thing for the NRA to do is get involved in the proposed projects that the BID is going to deliver. That way you will have influence.”

In recent years, the retail association, which was formed in 1999, has campaigned against traffic wardens in the town centre and was vocal in its fears that crime was going unrecorded when Newbury's CCTV system was switched to a new hub in Windsor and Maidenhead last year.

Eventually a review was carried out by West Berkshire Council's Overview and Scrutiny Committee, who made a number of recommendations last month.

The NRA's meeting next month has been cancelled in order for a new constitution to be drafted which will be voted on in September's meeting to be arranged.