Newmarket town councillors agree to spend more than £73k to reopen memorial hall garden toilets

Newmarket town councillors have agreed proposals to refurbish and reopen the memorial hall garden toilets after being forced to close them in the spring because of misuse and vandalism.

The cost of the project to town Council Tax payers will be in excess of £73,000 but councillors agreed it was something the authority had to fund despite Cllr Andy Drummond’s observation that the provision of public toilets was the responsibility of the district council

In her report to councillors meeting on Monday, town clerk Cathy Whitaker said a meeting had been held with Focus Washrooms, which will refurbish the toilets, and the project was expected to take four weeks and be completed by November.

The refurbishment work will include an upgraded entrance, three standard toilets with individual hand dryers and wash basins, one toilet for the disabled with hand dryer and wash basin and a baby changing table with hand washing and drying facilities.

The work would also include stripping out and replacing the old pipes, which had collapsed, and installing a new sewer connection

The project will also see CCTV upgraded and installed inside the toilet building outside the cubicles in a bid to deter the anti-social behaviour and misuse of the facilities, including putting disposable nappies down the toilets, which forced the council to close them.

Town mayor Cllr Philippa Winter said: “There is no doubt we are going to have to do something and this will be a full refit of the council’s toilets.”

Members were told West Suffolk Council, which currently made an annual contribution of £3,300 towards the toilets, was considering a contribution of around £5,000 towards the sewer connections and the security cameras.

The bulk of the project costs would come from the town council’s own reserves with contributions from its current budget and from the locality budgets of the town’s county and district councillors of around £8,000.

Cllr Drummond asked: “Can we at least get the police to patrol the toilets as we had to close them before because of drug use and them being used by the homeless so they need to be policed.”

While the toilets have been closed the council has installed temporary toilets in the memorial hall gardens which were to stay in place throughout the school summer holidays when the council puts on a series of summer events for youngsters and their families.

That arrangement will be reviewed heading into the autumn.