Less than 24 hours to the elections! Make your vote count for affordable housing in Oxford
How fantastic is this poster! In response to Red Pepper's call for campaign posters, Transition by Design answered the call out with an #endtoryrule poster that focuses on housing.
Check out Red Pepper's website for other creative campaign posters. Please feel free to share this poster with your friends, family and network - and be sure to make your vote count tomorrow! A sad day for Homes for Oxford - and the community
We've just heard that Homes for Oxford's bid to buy the Irving Building was unsuccessful. As you know we were doing this via Oxfordshire Community Land Trust.
All we know at this point is that the successful bid was not conditional on gaining planning approval (ours was conditional). We await with interest to find out who has won and what they plan to do on the site. Please let us know if you hear anything. In the meantime we are sitting tight and considering what we do next. We will be in touch again soon but for now we would like to say a hearty thank you for your support over the last two years. If anyone wants to see our bid brochure, click here. The day of reckoning is here!
The Irving Building in East Oxford
We have submitted our offer for the Irving Building accompanied by a stunning brochure and look forward to sharing it with you in due course (hopefully having been successful!).
The brochure is illustrated with several of the charming photos taken by one of the parents before the school closed (thank you, Kate). We were also able to use the many amazing messages of support from people like Bob Price (Leader of the Council), Peter Thompson (outgoing chair of Oxford Civic Society), Jayne Woodley (Oxfordshire Community Foundation), Danny Dorling (Oxford University) and many others all of whom would like to see a community-led housing project start in the city. The mission we are on is to create a thriving sector of community-owned permanently affordable homes in the city… without real affordability the city is not sustainable and we won’t have teachers, care workers (two groups we are especially concerned about), bus drivers etc. to run the place. So send positive vibes to those making the decision and if you still want to help further, make sure you’ve donated your bit to the Just Giving Fund. We’ll let you know here and via our email newsletter once we hear. Oh, and join us at the Rusty Bicycle (see map below for location) at 6pm tonight if you want to share a moment to celebrate getting in a great bid.
Bids in by this Friday at noon!
Only a few days to go now, bids in by Friday at noon! We have a great bid and we are all optimistic about securing this lovely building.
So please don’t forget to show your support by making a small donation and comment via our Just Giving page. It really helps us along the way to see your names and read your comments and know you are supporting us out there. If Just Giving isn't your thing but you'd like to contribute, then please contact us via fran.ryan@oclt.org.uk. Two weeks to go to submit the bid!
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Join us and be part of the community-led project to buy the Irving Building and create Oxford’s first community-led, affordable housing development.
HfO (Homes for Oxford) is working closely with Oxfordshire Community Land Trust (OLCT) to bid for the Irving Building, a former school in Hertford Street, East Oxford. The OCLT will lead the bid – currently in its advanced stage – and, if successful, the Trust will buy and develop the site, and retain the freehold of the land. The bid submission deadline is noon on Friday, 7 April and we need your help to secure this beautiful and historic building for affordable housing. We want to transform the site into a community-owned, mixed tenure development with at least 50 per cent of permanently affordable homes. And Parochial Church Council (PCC), which is selling the Irving Building, has added an imaginative requirement. They want the new owners to build a brand new hall, which the nursery school adjoining the site will be able to use. The new building could also be used by residents and the local community. This is an exciting addition and another reason why we are doing everything we can to make the winning bid! We are happy to tell you that the PCC has made it clear that any bids to demolish the Irving Building will not be considered, so this historic and beautiful old school will remain intact. As well as the new hall, as part of its charitable aims the PCC has specified that two affordable homes for key workers are to built and given back to them. Get involved As well as new hall, the PCC want bidders to include community feedback in their tender, so this is the perfect opportunity to have your say. As a bottom up community-led organisation, HfO feels confident that we can provide some useful insights from people living in the area so now is the time to share your views. You can do that by filling in our support form below. Another way you can get involved is to become a member of the Land Trust. We already have several members of the local community actively working with us on our proposals; so do get in touch if you’d like to help, too. Obstacles It’s always a worry with charity land disposal that lawyers will advise them to go for the highest price. And, as the community document outlines, the PCC need to consider the financial value of any bid quite seriously as they need to support work at the SSMJ Meadow Lane school site. So, there is still a risk that even though our bid will be good value and very much in line with short and long-term community benefit, a private developer with deep pockets could win the building. But the bid documents appear to suggest that, in this case, financial value of a bid alone will not suffice. Any thoughts on the best way to work around this obstacle gratefully received! What’s next? With the bid submission date looming - noon on Friday, 7 April - the time is now to act. We are continuing to work hard on creating the best bid in our power and fine tuning our designs in light of the new requirements. Our business manager is staying in touch with funders and locally we are rallying support. How you can help
DONATE: We still need to raise a bit more money for the final design via our Just Giving fundraising page. Donate here if you can – even small donations show that the community cares about what happens to the Irving Building. SUPPORT: Tell us your thoughts and give us a statement of support either here or in the form, below. This will also give us your contact details so that we can let you know the result. Your details won’t be passed on to outside parties, and will only be used to show the PCC the level of support we have locally. 
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A gallery of photos of the beautiful Irving Building in Hertford Street, East Oxford
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About us
Homes for Oxford (HfO) is a new alliance of local housing organisations, which combines their passion and expertise to combat the housing crisis in Oxford.
Our community led organisation has been created by residents, for residents, to meet the local housing need.
AFFORDABILITYOur commitment is to ensuring that affordable homes remain genuinely and permanently affordable over time.
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SUSTAINABILITYBuilt for reduced environmental impact to ensure the long-term future of the local and wider community.
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COMMUNITYOur homes will be designed for community living; mutual support and well-being, with plenty of green space.
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VIEW OUR LATEST VIDEO
WHAT WE DOCommunity-led housing initiatives, past and present: the Wolvercote Paper Mill project, the Irving Building project and the Kindling project.
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.© COPYRIGHT 2016 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Windmill by GP from the Noun Project. People icon by Moh Kamaru from the Noun Project
