Birmingham City Council has recently adopted a new policy to accelerate community-led housing in the city, encouraging groups to link up with social housing providers to get projects built.
The move includes plans to appoint an enabling partner to assess suitable sites, and to set up a network of trusted development partners, such as registered providers, to work with community-led groups on schemes.
Elected members attending the visit included Cllrs Mary Locke, David Barker, David Barrie, Gareth Moore, Lee Marsham and Colin Green alongside Birmingham City Council worker Sarah Scannell who gained further insight into community-led housing schemes by hearing from members of the Stirchley Co-operative Development ( SCD).
The £10.4 million SCD development, located in the heart of Stirchley, which will be owned and managed by SCD will provide:
- 39 affordable rental homes with laundries and common garden spaces.
- Fit-for-purpose premises for three existing co-operative businesses that are currently renting privately in Stirchley.
- A new community space including a pedestrian walkway, seating, a shared garden and cycle parking.
Dorit Kaempfer-Krull of Loaf, one of the cooperative businesses which will be moving into the SCD building, said: "I think for Loaf it will be a big improvement to have a much brighter and purpose-built place to work.
“It will not only help us to present who we are and what we stand for as a workers' co-op, but it will also help us to secure our own jobs with the economy making it harder and harder to run a bakery and cookery school which still wants to offer affordable healthy bread and teach people how to cook good food.”
The community-owned development is being built by in-house construction team at GreenSquareAccord (GSA) who took over the contract in April 2024.
Commenting on the visit, Project Manager Mary Doria at GSA said: “It was a real pleasure to welcome the delegation from Birmingham City Council to the SCD building.
“We are delighted to hear that the City Council will be seeking to support similar community-led initiatives and we are proud that the innovative Stirchley development is setting an example for others to follow in the provision of affordable and energy-efficient homes and workspaces.”
The project plans were unanimously approved by Birmingham City Council in 2021, and SCD purchased the site from Seven Capital in August 2022 after securing significant funding from Homes England and the European Interreg NWE.
Find out more about the SCD development here