A recent decision of the Valuation Tribunal in respect of Paces Campus raises a question which might have wider interest and application.
First, let me tell you a little about the Campus, as factually as I am able.
Paces, a charity founded by and working with children and adults with cerebral palsy and their families, first occupied the premises of the former High Green Comprehensive School in 1997, under a Licence to Occupy from Sheffield City Council. Our expressed intent, by opening up the building to other charitable and non-for-profit groups, was to set our work in an inclusive community setting - as we thought of it, a perfectly ordinary community centre.
Mutuality was an important founding principle, eventually finding expression in the creation of High Green Development Trust, an association of all resident groups, to hold and to share in common the management of common services and costs. The Trust took over the Licence to Occupy in 2004 and in 2009 was granted a 40-year lease. In addition to groups sharing the premises, the Trust lets rooms and facilities (eg meeting rooms, IT and sports facilities) by the hour.
In 2010, a question arose as to how Business Rates should be assessed which eventually led to a Valuation Tribunal hearing. The Trust had by then conceded that the previous practice, whereby the Campus was assessed as a single business should be replaced by each resident group being responsible for its own rates. At Tribunal, the question came down to whether or not Paces Campus was a "community centre": in the words of the Decision:
i to value the appeal properties in line with other community centres;
or
ii. to value the appeal properties in line with an adjusted open market commercial rate
In determing whether or not Paces Campus is a "community centre", the Valuation Officer "had turned to the dictionary definition which showed that a community centre was a meeting place where the local community may come together to participate in activities". (One might find using a dictionary definition rather than a statutory definition somewhat surprising, even irrelevant).
In reaching their decision, the Tribunal Panel made as a "finding of fact" that "a regular/usual Community Centre was expected to be occupied on a transient, temporary basis ....".
As Paces Campus "did not fit on all fours with the traditional community centres such as [A. B and C] ..." and although all resident groups are not-for-profit organisations, "an uplift in the basis normally attributable to community centres was required in order to reflect its quasi-commercial use". In other words, instead of £25-£26.25 per sq metre, resident groups at Paces Campus, said by the Tribunal Panel to be, not a community centre, but a "hybrid", were assessed at £30 per sq metre; less, thankfully, than the £42 we had finally been assessed at before the Tribunal but the lack of recognition, as we see it, of our "community centre" status and the consequent 'uplift' was a disappointment.
So, when is a community centre NOT a community centre? If you manage a "community centre" or occupy space at a "community centre" are you sure it is indeed a community centre and not a "quasi-commercial" "hybrid"? How would you know? How are you assessed for Business Rates, collectively or separately and how much is the valuation?