07 Jul 2026
Previously unknown details about the controversial William Bird community centre development have emerged at a public exhibition into the plans.
SADC is investing £6.4m in a new community hub at the site on Toulmin Drive in New Greens, creating a modern, accessible and flexible facility, alongside high-quality changing rooms, a café and fully equipped kitchen, and other provisions.
The scheme will replace the derelict pavilion, which closed in 2022, and the existing New Greens Residents’ Association social club in High Oaks.
Speaking at the first public exhibition related to the plans at Townsend School last Tuesday, June 30, Batchwood district councillor Lynn Cunningham said the project had effectively been fast-tracked because of the impending Local Government Reorganisation, which will see SADC dissolved and replaced with a unitary authority.
She explained that a feasibility study into the scheme took place last year to determine whether SADC could raise enough money for the project and ensure its long-term sustainability.
“We knew that if it wasn’t signed off in the last budget in February then it wouldn’t be passed because there wouldn’t be a substantial budget and it might not be approved by a unitary authority, so officers worked really hard and fast to get it signed off.
“The outline proposal was shown to some people, including New Greens Residents Association and the Centurions Rugby Club, so there has been a lot of discussion, but it hasn’t been that much in the public domain.”
She said the project will be mainly funded from external sources, including Section 106 money from the north St Albans housing developments and funding from Sport England, plus the asset disposal of disused SADC garages.
The council will also take out a loan on the outstanding balance which will be repaid when the existing social club site is sold for homes.
Cllr Cunningham said feedback from the public exhibition will serve to further tweak the plans, and the scheme is very much a work in progress.
Last week’s meeting of SADC’s strategy and resources committee saw a heated debate over the proposals, with questions being raised not only about disability provision but also about the tone of the meeting and the council’s approach to community engagement.
Committee chair and council leader Cllr Paul de Kort told Labour leader Cllr Mike Hobday that he should “win 28 more seats” if he wished to influence decisions and remarked that he appeared to want to be sitting in the chair’s position.
A video clip of the exchange, shared on social media after the meeting, has since been viewed more than 30,000 times across TikTok and Facebook, with many comments debating whether the leader of the council’s language and behaviour reflected the standards of conduct residents expect from public meetings.
Speaking after the meeting, Cllr Hobday said: “Labour councillors want this project to succeed – it’s a bold and ambitious attempt to improve facilities in a long-neglected part of St Albans.
“But secrecy and poor governance are inevitably putting success at risk.
“The whole redevelopment of the William Bird pavilion has been a project shrouded in secrecy.
“Local residents were not consulted until after the council had set the budget, so they were not able to influence the early plans for the new building. Instead they are forced to complain and argue for proper kitchen facilities and for accessibility after the budget has been set.
“Councillors have also been given minimal information, with the administration steering council officers on property issues in private at the corporate property board, now renamed as the asset management steering group. I have repeatedly asked for notes of asset management steering group meetings, but I am told that meeting notes are not available.
“There are still important questions that the council has not answered.
“How will the housing department, which owns the New Greens Social Club, be compensated for the site. Will it be recompensed for the profit from the expected development at the social club site?
“As the proposed building grows in response to residents’ complaints, how much has the capital cost increased?
“How much does the council expect to borrow at each stage of the development?
“Who are the expected external funders of the project, and what conditions are they likely to impose?
“It is ridiculous to plan such a major development in secret. Local residents deserved to have their views built in to the council’s thinking from the very start, not after the budget had been set.
“It is also concerning that the public announcement of the project did not come from a council statement, but in a political press release from the Liberal Democrats. It is interesting that the one previous public event, organised by Liberal Democrat councillors, was timed during the pre-election ‘purdah’ period, when council officers could not attend to explain plans to local residents. All this raises the question about how much of the project design was intended to boost the administration political party in what was then the most marginal ward in the district.”
And Conservative group leader Cllr Matt Cowley added: “St Albans district council has committed an enormous amount of taxpayer money to the William Bird Pavilion – more than £6m. But as yet the strategy and resources committee has yet to see any information on the business case, what options have been considered and where the money is coming from.
“That’s why I brought a councillor Item to the most recent meeting of the committee to bring out some more of that detail for us to scrutinise.
“Decisions on major projects should be taken with as much public and councillor involvement as possible, so that we can ensure that taxpayer money has been spent effectively. Whilst that hasn’t happened so far with this project, I hope that the discussion at strategy and resources will be the start of a wider conversation about the detail of this project.”
During the strategy and resources meeting, Sopwell’s Cllr Harriet Sherlock referred to the Changing Places disabled toilets facility at the Cottonmill Community and Cycling Centre, suggesting it was scarcely used and questioning whether such a facility should be included at New Greens.
However, Michelle Mackenzie, chair of the Cottonmill and Sopwell Hub campaign that secured the Cottonmill centre, said afterwards that the suggestion fails to recognise why initial usage of this fully accessible space may have been low.
“The community raised more than £70,000 to fund the £64,000 Changing Places facility because we believed it was essential for an inclusive community building,” she said.
According to Ms Mackenzie, the facility remained absent from the national Changing Places directory for around two years despite repeated requests from community representatives for the council to register it.
The campaign group’s minutes from the Cottonmill Community and Cycling Centre Forum meetings show the issue being raised repeatedly between February 2023 and July 2024. The records include repeated references to officers undertaking to progress the registration, while community representatives continued reporting that the facility was still missing from the national map.
Chair of Sopwell Residents Association Gail Jackson said: “Not only were we asking for the Changing Places facility to be registered so that individuals and groups for people with disabilities knew it was there, we also repeatedly suggested that a large event was held at the centre specifically for people with disabilities, in order to promote and celebrate this fully accessible community space. This never happened.”
The issue resurfaced the day after the committee meeting when New Greens campaigner Damian Gaskin published video evidence showing that the Cottonmill listing contained incorrect information, including what he says is a Bristol telephone number, incorrect opening hours and the wrong manager’s name.
Campaigners argue that if disabled users cannot easily find a facility, or are given inaccurate information once they do, usage figures become an unreliable measure of demand.
The discussion then moved beyond accessibility and into the wider question of how the council had engaged with the community. After Cllr Harriet Sherlock’s comments about the Cottonmill Changing Places facility, Cllr de Kort described her contribution as “local expertise”, accepting her account without challenge before praising what he described as the professionalism of the council and its officers.
Cllr Helen Campbell also strongly defended the professionalism of council staff and objected to suggestions that officers had failed in their duties by not engaging with local residents.
Local campaigners dispute claims that the council has undertaken extensive stakeholder engagement on the William Bird Community Hub project.
A Freedom of Information response obtained by campaigners has, they say, raised significant questions about that assertion. The response contains no minutes of meetings with stakeholder groups over more than two years, despite emails referring to meetings having taken place and SADC officer Tom Hardy saying meetings were now into “double figures”.
Damian Gaskin of CHANGE! (Community Hub Action for the New Greens Estate) said they are not arguing that mistakes never happen, but their concerns are that shortcomings in consultation, communication and record-keeping should be acknowledged and addressed, rather than being met with public declarations that the council’s engagement has been comprehensive and its processes beyond question.
“Confidence in major public projects is built not by assertions of professionalism alone, but by transparent records, meaningful consultation, facts rather than opinion, respectful dialogue, an attempt to understand and empathise with community members, and a willingness to recognise when mistakes have been made and improvements are needed.”
Last Tuesday’s exhibition saw dozens of local residents see the full plans for the scheme for the first time, although some complained that the drawings on display contained no dimensions, making it difficult to judge the true size of rooms and circulation areas.
“The kitchen floor space is the same size as the pool table – open a cupboard and there will be no room,” said Janet Byott, a member of the Maple Club which has used the current social club building for 70 years.
Ruth Tudor, a resident of Harpenden Road, less than 400m from the proposed development, said: “The presentation did not show a comparison of the relative sizes of the existing space and the proposed development, so it is not possible to tell whether there is any equivalence between existing and proposed spaces.
“There should have been a plan showing the existing social club drawn to the same scale as the proposal.”
Campaigners noted that the plans still did not include a Changing Places toilet and still showed only a single lift despite concerns raised only days earlier at committee.
Liz Elvidge of New Greens and part of the council’s Accessibility Forum said: “There is currently no Changing Places facilities and only one lift.
“Without two lifts many residents for whom a lift is essential will be put off using this new £6.5 million development – two lifts are needed because you’ve got many people able to walk stairs who will take the lift plus tradespeople using it to transport equipment to the stage, bar and kitchen on the first floor plus all the sports teams using them and then the great number of wheelchair users and carers, elderly and infirm wanting to access the lift won’t be able to. And, of course, when one lift breaks down, what do we all do? So two lifts are essential.”
Drawing on decades of experience running the existing community club, the New Greens Residents’ Association committee says several operational requirements remain essential if the building is to function successfully.
Committee member Barry Fitzgerald said: “There must be two lifts, including one suitable for deliveries; dedicated office space; chilled storage of at least 48 sq meters ; a second bar serving the upstairs function space; practical delivery access; flexible storage; a flexible performance stage; a dance floor; and an integrated sound system suitable for community events- because that’s what we have now. these are practical operational requirements rather than a wish list.”
SADC has indicated that it hopes to submit a planning application for the project in August, with construction potentially beginning in the spring of 2027.
Neighbours say this leaves very little time for feedback from the first public exhibition to influence a scheme that already appears to be well advanced, with key design decisions having been made.
New Greens resident Michael Cowell, also a member of the council’s Accessibility Forum, questioned the idea that the building would be ‘a community hub’: “The new pavilion building is on the periphery of the community and I am concerned that in that time it could become less of a community centre and more of building for the rugby club with little use to locals.”
Fellow resident Krystyna Berners-Lee said: “I do not understand why residents weren’t consulted much earlier in the process as we will be most affected. A new community centre on the current central New Greens site makes more sense, located as it is near the shops and church, Moving it to the outskirts is unacceptable.”
Jackie Seaton added: “My hopes for the regeneration were for something that would create a vibrant focal point for community events and activities, which would be at the heart of our community. I’m afraid that, in my opinion, this doesn’t offer us that.
“It is set on the outskirts of New Greens estate, on a playing field, and shared not just with locals, football teams, but also rugby teams who are from a wide area.
“New Greens is already an under-served estate compared to other parts of St Albans. Almost no recreational facilities for children or adults, little in the way of amenities or services. No library, public toilets, restaurants or cafés, no pub nor Post Office. And this is a wasted opportunity to help make a neglected part of St Albans into a more genuine community.”
Nearby neighbours have also expressed concerns about increased activity, traffic and evening noise affecting Flint Way, Toulmin Drive, Sparrowswick Ride, Henderson Close and Woollam Crescent.
Campaigners emphasise that they support investment in new community facilities and agree that the ageing William Bird Pavilion should be replaced, but what they question is not the ambition of the project, but the process behind it.
They say if SADC wants residents to have confidence in the final decision, confidence must be earned through evidence, openness and genuine engagement with the community it seeks to serve.
Cllr Lynn Cunningham has insisted that this is just the beginning of the consultation process, with residents very much involved throughout.
Ultimately all parties want to see this community hub become a thriving success which reinvigorates the New Greens area, but whether they can come together to ensure this happens has yet to be determined.
