34 CONFERENCE REPORT GOTA PROJECT? Have a go at the Lottery, but have a fall back position up your sleeve The Twelfth Annual Conference of the Eastof England Branch of the Association of Conservation Officers entitled Is Conservation Just a Lottery? recently exercised the minds of the assembled cognoscenti on the topic of funding conservation initiatives. Sponsored by Greene King brewery, the conference gave two messages. One was the obvious - how to tap into newly available moneys from such things as the Lottery funds, Millennium initiatives and Conservation Area Partnership Schemes. The other ran like an unacknowledged thread through the proceedings - conservation makes good economic sense. In this context bidding for extra funds is of most help in the cases of problem buildings or areas. This was most clearly expressed by ColinRedman ofGrosvenor Estateswhich owns much of the west end of London with numerous listed buildings and conservation areas. He provided a beginners' guide to valuation ofleasehold commercial properties. His tenet was simple: improve the historic property and increase not only the rent but most importantly the yieldand hence the capital value. To attract stable tenants witl1 full repairing leases there needs to be a sound building and a good incentive for owners tosecurethestructureandmakeitusable. Where buildings were not usable due to condition or layout, their yield and value would be correspondingly low. This was the area which produced the most contentious cases and provided an analysis of why buildings could deteriorate, whirling into a vortex of ruin from which they were difficult to rescue. The evangelising Derek Latham is a successful saviour of many difficult buildings. He outlined his approach with case studies. He recommended: have a clear vision of what might be done; persuade everyone else to consider and then take ownership of the problem; explore all sources offunding, assembling them for a fully costed up scheme followed by an interim feasibility study. He suggested being prepared to change course and never taking no for an answer. The results of this approach, allied to the flair and vision of the schemes, themselves demonstrated that the resourceful use of a variety of funding sources could salvage apparently hopeless cases. That buildings could be brought back into the mainstream fmancial market by these methods wa also articulately outlined by John Preston of Cambridge City Council in his resume of the ongoing rescue of the Can1bridge Arts Theatre. WHAT MONEYSWEREAVAILABLE? Jane Sharman, Head of Conservation, at English Heritage, outlined the transition from 400 Town Schemes to 200-250 Conservation Area Partnerships spread across 9,000 conservation areas. Her parting message was that, while English Heritage may have to make budget cuts, this was unlikely to affect CAPSin the foreseeable future. An annual budget of just over £11 millionwas availableand while this money was both useful and targeted it was small change in comparison to tl1e moneys potentially available from the Lottery Fund. Jon Burgess of Cambridge City Council outlined his experience of four Conservation Area Partnership bids and schemes in Cambridge and Peterborough which provided a useful fillip for those expending copious amounts of energy in the process. He demonstrated that, if successful, valuable things subsequently happened on the ground. Stuart McDonald, head of the Lottery Division of the Department of National Heritage, in outlining its structure and its distribution mechanisms, revealed that the coffers were huge in comparison to EnglishHeritage (£767 million distributed already across all sections). Well thought out schemes with local support were most likely to succeed, and partnership funding as sought in the bids. It was clear that bodies making applications had to be well versed in the competitive building culture if they were to benefit from the available largesse. Susan Carmichael of Constructive Futures outlined her experience of unsuccessfully bidding to make Liverpool City of Architecture and Design 1999. What she had to say was illllll1inatingfor two reasons; first because her experience had taught her to make things happen on the ground whether the bid was successful or not, so that the considerable effort required in the bidding process was not wasted if the bid failed; and secondly, because of the language and style she adopted as a practitioner of the bidding culture. The repetitious use of superlative adjectives suggested that there was a certain melody which would charm the gatekeepers of the funds, and, that there was a burgeoning industry based on hitting tl1e right note with them. Wortl1 bearing in mind next time you see the concept video for a millennium project bid, and allthe more reason to have a Plan B up your sleeve if the bid fails. A lesson which will not have been lost on the many smaller scale bidders for CAPS: "If you're not a winner you don't have to be a loser". This conference was the last to be so ably chaired by Russ Craig. Never short of an apposite quotation or an effusive biography of a speaker, he has always played his part in making this event topical, informative and stimulating and this year was no exception. Francis Biard CONTEXT49
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