Stroud News and Journal:

WORK on a massive 10 year project to update and improve the district’s sheltered housing will soon be underway.

Stroud District Council (SDC) is investing £4.6 million over the next decade to bring 24 sites up to modern standards and prepare them for future generations.

In 2017 half a million pounds will be spent on the first major phase of the renovation, with a number of properties in the Five Valleys set for upgrades.

Work will include modernising communal lounges, improving accessibility, creating colour schemes which will help residents with dementia, installing lifts, building mobility scooter stores and improving parking.

However, nearly 20 per cent of SDC’s sheltered housing units are also due to be scrapped as part of the changes.

This will see 152 homes in four sheltered housing schemes close or be demolished over the next six years.

This decision from followed an independent report which found that these sites did not meet standards and had to be decommissioned.

Ringfield Close in Nailsworth, Dryleaze Court in Wotton under Edge and Cambridge House in Dursley will close, and Glebelands in Cam will be demolished.

Willow Road in Stonehouse was also earmarked for closure, but is still under review as part of a possible wider regeneration project.

Around 100 tenants from these properties, many of whom are vulnerable and in their 80s and 90s, are being relocated to other accommodation in phases.

Already the process is underway to move sheltered housing residents out of two schemes, with the other two expected to shut by January, 2021.

Over the last few months around 50 tenants from Dryleaze Court have been relocated into a property adjoining the site called Dryleaze House.

A further 30 of so residents from Ringfield Close have been moved in stages to other schemes in the district when places became available.

Some portion of the tenants living in sheltered housing sites have chosen to relocate outside the district.

The council has continually stressed it is working closely with all residents to move them to “suitable” homes in a quick and stress-free way – and that tenants whose schemes are being closed are all being helped to find new, permanent residence.

However some have raised concerns that moving elderly people away from the homes they’ve lived in for many years will inevitably cause distress.

The Conservative group in Ebley Mill has called on the Labour-led council to make sure tenants are treated “sensitively”.

Debbie Young, Conservative spokesman for Housing, said: "The review of sheltered housing has taken years and was started by the Conservatives, we have worked with the administration to progress the project.

“We are concerned that residents of schemes set for demolition are treated sensitively and their needs put first.

“We also hope that the 'hub and spoke’ model will be promoted, this encourages people to use the communal lounges for a wide variety of activities for our tenants to enjoy.”

Cllr Mattie Ross (Labour/Stonehouse) chair of the Housing Committee, said she was “extremely proud” of the way the situation had been handled so far.

“Of course we realise the challenges of moving elderly people at this stage in their lives,” she said.

“We are working sheltered housing staff to do everything we can to carefully and sensitively manage this situation.

“Tenants have been given one on one meetings to discuss where they would like to move and then matched exactly with their preferences. So far we’ve had very few complaints.

“Stroud District Council is also working with staff to arrange all the removals, packing, unpacking, post redirection and cooker connections.”

She added the council added it was doing its best to make sure tenants were being moved in clusters, in order to preserve friendship-groups.

Sheltered housing tenants will also be paid £5,800 in compensation to reimburse them for the hassle and money spent decorating their new homes.

When the properties are emptied it is understood they will be put on the market next year, with price tags worth several hundred thousand or even a million pounds.

This money will be rechannelled into funding the next stages of SDC’s decade long project.

Currently there 817 homes in 29 sheltered housing schemes which cater specifically for those over 65 or vulnerable people in Stroud district.

Stroud News and Journal:

Ringfield Close in Nailsworth