A FURTHER £80,000 is to be awarded to a scheme to repair the roof of an indoor bowls club.
Torfaen Borough Council had already allocated £150,000 towards the roof of the Cwmbran Stadium Bowls Club, however a tender exercise has put the bill at £232,000.
As a result, Torfaen council’s Labour leader Anthony Hunt is due to approve a further £82,000 from a special £1.5 million fund the council set up at the end of the 2021/22 financial year.
The original allocation was made from the fund created as a special, or earmarked, reserve to pay for or contribute towards projects that would help the council’s aim to support communities.
When the original allocation towards the bowls club roof was made, it was noted there was a risk the tendered cost could exceed the initial estimate.
Flood defences
The additional amount for the bowls club, and a further £25,000 towards flood defences, are covered by the remaining £735,000 balance in the fund, which will reduce to £628,000 following approval for the two schemes totalling £107,000.
A report by head of financial services, Robert Green, said: “These additional commitments are affordable from within that amount (£735,000), without the need for any other schemes to be reduced or removed from the programme.”
The £25,000 for flood defences will be used to buy specialised flood gates for individual properties and a special type of sandbag that can be deployed to properties at risk of flooding.
The council says it will use data to decide which properties should benefit from the new flood defence tools.
The council cabinet has previously allocated £765,000 from the fund, most recently towards a new 3G sports pitch in Blaenavon, and other projects include the council’s spring clean project, resurfacing play areas and sprucing up war memorials.
A further report on how to spend the remaining balance of £628,000 will be brought forward for approval at a later date.