Agenda item

            The Committee considered the undernoted report:

“1.0     Purpose of Report or Summary of main Issues

1.1            To advise elected Members of the approaching termination date of the Facilities Management Agreement with Suffolk Football Club and to seek approval as to the future relationship with this club.

2.0       Recommendations

2.1       The Committee is asked to recommend that:

·        The Facilities Management Agreement dated 9th August 2012 be terminated in line with its maximum term of 7 years. It is further recommended that Suffolk Football Club are offered preferential use of facilities at this location for a period of 10 years in recognition of their initial capital investment in development of the pitch and the ongoing management and maintenance of the site entirely at the expense of the club.

3.0       Main report

Key Issues

3.1       Up until May 2017, Suffolk Football Club had two Facilities Management Agreements (FMA) in place on a number of pitches at the playing fields at Carnamore Park. The FMA from 2008 terminated in May 2017 and control of the three pitches it related to reverted to Belfast City Council.

3.2       A second agreement, in place since August 2012, related to a single pitch at the same site. This pitch had been disused for many years. Suffolk Football Club applied for Alpha funding to carry out the necessary drainage works to bring the pitch back into use. The work was carried out at no cost to Belfast City Council and the reinstated pitch was given into the control of Suffolk Football Club under the seven year FMA dated August 2012. No financial support accompanied the FMA and the club maintained the pitch entirely at their own expense.

3.3       In 2014, as part of the capital programme, the Council improved the facilities associated with the Suffolk Football Club pitch, installing new changing and meeting facilities in the form of modular buildings. These facilities have to date also been managed and maintained by the club at their expense. The club have been playing at IFA intermediate league standard at this site.

3.4       Members will recall that Facilities Management Agreements across sports sites are to be phased out. A report submitted to the People and Communities Committee in August 2016, authorised officers to engage with Suffolk Football Club and other clubs in similar circumstances to regularise arrangements for the management of sites after FMAs terminate.

3.5       Council officers engaged with Suffolk Football Club over several months and are recommending that the club be offered preferential use of this single pitch at Suffolk Playing fields, in recognition of their considerable financial investment over the last seven years in the management and maintenance of this pitch and its facilities. The offer of preferential use would align the club’s position to that agreed by the People and Communities Committee in May 2017 for the facility at Clarendon Playing fields.

3.6       The financial investment of the club into this site in the last seven years, over and above the initial £30,700 grant for pitch improvement works, has amounted to £105,000 made up of annual maintenance and management expenditure of £15,000 on the buildings and pitch.

Financial and Resource Implications

3.7       All income achieved from bookings for this pitch will now revert to the Belfast City Council and will be used to offset the annual maintenance costs, which had previously been the responsibility of Suffolk Football Club.

3.8       The £10,000 transition payment made available to some other FMA holders on termination of their agreement will not apply in this case as the FMA with Suffolk Football Club was not supported by any financial contribution by the Council and the club will not be at a financial detriment by the new arrangement.

Equality or Good Relations Implications/

Rural Needs Assessment

3.9       There are no equality, good relations or rural needs implications associated with this report.”

            The Committee adopted the recommendations.