Broadfield House to Close

[KevinH]

Notice now added to my Kevh Glass web page
Glass Association now signed

[yelooc]

Some Numbers:

Broadfield House hoasted one third of the events at the hugely successful 'International Festival of Glass' in August; 10,000 visitors attended the festival and the council have reported that the event brought in an estimated £500k to the local economy. Broadfield House had 4,800 attendees in August!

Broadfield House visitor numbers are going up every year; the festival is hugely successful.

http://www.ifg.org.uk/home.html

Graham

[aa]

Clearly, Broadfield House is one of the jewels in Dudley's crown!

[yelooc]

I received this today, as did many others:


Directorate of the Urban Environment
Culture & Leisure
Claughton House, Blowers Green Road, Dudley, West Midlands
Tel: (01384) 818181  Fax: (01384) 815599  Minicom: (01384) 814686
www.dudley.gov.uk

Our Ref:  KS/DWL/SAN               Please ask for:  D W Lowndes         Direct Line:  01384 815501      
   


26 January 2009   


Dear Sir/Madam

Broadfield House

Thank you for your letter, which I have read with great interest.

I fully appreciate the concerns that you and others have raised regarding the future of the Borough’s Internationally renowned Glass Collections and how they can be preserved and enhanced for future generations.

I would like to firstly explain that we are not shutting the glass museum and attempting to either put the collections in the existing space at Redhouse Cone or into storage, which appears to be a major worry for many people who have contacted me.

The location of Broadfield House is not ideal from the point of view of a visitor attraction. It is not easily accessible to many people who visit the Red House Cone, which is shown, by the number of visitors to each Museum. There are in excess of 20,000 more visitors to the Cone each year, which is one of the reasons why I would like to look at the option of relocating the entire collection to a single site. Clearly, this would have to entail an expansion of the existing Red House site. 
 
I have called for a study on the feasibility of moving the collections and housing them in the Glass Quarter at The Red House Cone.

I appreciate that this will not be a process that can happen overnight and there will be a great deal of work that needs to be completed to ensure that we have covered all bases and understand fully the complexity and cost of what we would like to achieve. 

I see this very much as an opportunity to enhance and improve the services provided to visitors and glass enthusiasts, set in the context of how the traditional glass was produced and I want to be certain that this can be achieved before any decisions are taken.
 
Sadly, armed with only a small amount of information, the press don’t always reflect the full picture of what is trying to be achieved and therefore I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to explain more fully.

It is heartening to know that there are so many people who care passionately about glass and its place in the boroughs heritage and I will do everything possible to ensure that its place is preserved, protected and enhanced.

I will make sure that we retain your contact details and keep you updated of any progress which will also give you the opportunity to be included in the consultation on any fully worked proposals that may come from our study.

Yours faithfully

Cllr Karen Shakespeare
Halesowen North Ward Councillor
Cabinet Member for the Environment & Culture

[aa]

I too received this and will shortly be replying. My preliminary thoughts are that I am not over impressed. I think we need to keep up the momentum of the campaign. This seems to be standard bureaucrat-speak designed to fob us off and it is certainly not a pledge to keep the museum open.

[yelooc]

Adam,

I totally agree; in fact a councillor told me today that the staff at Broadfield House have been asked to conduct the feasibility study! This and the letter from cll Karen Shakespeare confirms that a study has not been undertaken; so how has a saving of £120k been identified?

In short this letter confirms that, to date, this has been done without a study, budget or plan.

Graham

[sph@ngw]

My take is that if a move must be made,

 (and one needs to be realistic in these challenging economic times), a move to the old Webb Corbett offices instead

 of the Glass Cone would be much better, for the following reasons

 

 1.The Ruskin Centre is the new dynamic heart of glass making in the area- there is no Museum there.

2. Students will visit the Museum and be inspired by what was done before. They could sell their ware in the Museum shop.

3. The building is decaying and needs a purpose, and to be restored with Council help.

4. It is a listed Historic building where glass was made and designed.

5. There is more car parking that at Broadfield House.

6. It is about the size of the Broadfield House, and while perhaps not quite so elegant, already has glass making along side it!

7. Nowadays we have to be constructive and not just say “do not close it!” Councillors can show how much it is costing and how few visitors

    it attracts pro rata, to save £120,000 or about 4/5 council staff jobs a year!

 

Anyway that is my take.

Kind regards,

Stephen.

[sph@ngw]

May I post the official version to stop any untrue rumours going round. I have received this in the last hour thanks to Alan Poole of Dan Klein Assocs.


Directorate of the Urban Environment
Culture & Leisure
Claughton House, Blowers Green Road, Dudley, West Midlands
Tel: (01384) 818181  Fax: (01384) 815599  Minicom: (01384) 814686
www.dudley.gov.uk

Your Ref:                  Our Ref:  KS/DWL/SAN               Please ask for:  D W Lowndes         Direct Line:  01384 815501   


26 January 2009   


Dear Sir/Madam

Broadfield House

Thank you for your letter, which I have read with great interest.

I fully appreciate the concerns that you and others have raised regarding the future of the Borough’s Internationally renowned Glass Collections and how they can be preserved and enhanced for future generations.

I would like to firstly explain that we are not shutting the glass museum and attempting to either put the collections in the existing space at Redhouse Cone or into storage, which appears to be a major worry for many people who have contacted me.

The location of Broadfield House is not ideal from the point of view of a visitor attraction. It is not easily accessible to many people who visit the Red House Cone, which is shown, by the number of visitors to each Museum. There are in excess of 20,000 more visitors to the Cone each year, which is one of the reasons why I would like to look at the option of relocating the entire collection to a single site. Clearly, this would have to entail an expansion of the existing Red House site. 
 
I have called for a study on the feasibility of moving the collections and housing them in the Glass Quarter at The Red House Cone.

I appreciate that this will not be a process that can happen overnight and there will be a great deal of work that needs to be completed to ensure that we have covered all bases and understand fully the complexity and cost of what we would like to achieve. 

I see this very much as an opportunity to enhance and improve the services provided to visitors and glass enthusiasts, set in the context of how the traditional glass was produced and I want to be certain that this can be achieved before any decisions are taken.
 
Sadly, armed with only a small amount of information, the press don’t always reflect the full picture of what is trying to be achieved and therefore I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to explain more fully.

It is heartening to know that there are so many people who care passionately about glass and its place in the boroughs heritage and I will do everything possible to ensure that its place is preserved, protected and enhanced.

I will make sure that we retain your contact details and keep you updated of any progress which will also give you the opportunity to be included in the consultation on any fully worked proposals that may come from our study.

Yours faithfully

 

Cllr Karen Shakespeare
Halesowen North Ward Councillor
Cabinet Member for the Environment & Culture

[David E]

Thanks for this Stephen.

I see this very much as an opportunity to enhance and improve the services provided to visitors and glass enthusiasts, set in the context of how the traditional glass was produced and I want to be certain that this can be achieved before any decisions are taken.

Enhance and improve? How can she possibly come to this conclusion? Shoe-horning the existing museum into [perhaps] a quarter of the space is hardly what I would call an improvement... this is a denegration of the service, pure and simple.

I will be writing to Cllr. Shakespeare about this.

[sph@ngw]

OOOps sorry Graham to repeat the letter, you beat me to the keyboard and I did not scroll right through all seven pages!
Regards, Stephen.

[Frank]

The location of Broadfield House is not ideal from the point of view of a visitor attraction. It is not easily accessible to many people who visit the Red House Cone, which is shown, by the number of visitors to each Museum. There are in excess of 20,000 more visitors to the Cone each year, which is one of the reasons why I would like to look at the option of relocating the entire collection to a single site. Clearly, this would have to entail an expansion of the existing Red House site. 
 
I have called for a study on the feasibility of moving the collections and housing them in the Glass Quarter at The Red House Cone.

I appreciate that this will not be a process that can happen overnight and there will be a great deal of work that needs to be completed to ensure that we have covered all bases and understand fully the complexity and cost of what we would like to achieve. 

This somewhat contradicts the intention of saving 120,000 per annum! One a feasibility study... cost at least 30,000.

Admitting the space is insufficient at the Red Cone can only mean constructing a facility of similar size to Broadfield house... cost several millions, cost of financing would thus be tens of thousands of extra costs to the council. Relocation of the collection securely could also figure around 500,000. Selling Broadfield house would be difficult in this climate and have a relatively low input to financing the move.

Where is the saving? There is no possible way to achieve a saving by relocating such a Museum unless someone else is providing a grant to do so and if that was the case surely it would have been mentioned from the start as an enhancement program.

I guess the reality is that it never occurred to them that anyone would care and are now struggling to find a face saving way out.

[aa]

272 signatures in 24 hours is a good start but nowhere near enough to make the council give an irrevocable commitment to ensure the survival of Broadfield House.

One way everyone can help is to send an email to all your friends, families and contacts - indeed everyone in your address book - asking them to sign the online petition and including the link  http://www.gopetition.com/online/24751.html so that they they can click through to the petition.

You can also ask them to forward it to all their address book contacts, and so on.

 

[nigel benson]

                        HELP SAVE BROADFIELD HOUSE GLASS MUSEUM
                                             YOUR VOICE counts

Hello All,

I too received the rather underwhelming email from cll Karen Shakespeare. Rereading it in a number of other places has not improved my opinion of it. As has been said it seems to be very much a letter that had to be sent out.

There had heard a rumour, now confirmed by a counsellor, that it was indeed the staff at Broadfield House who had been 'commissioned' to undertake the feasibility study. In my opinion, this is just a ruse to say that the thing was ongoing, after all those same staff also have to continue with all their other duties whilst undertaking the study - so how long would it end up taking..........?

It still doesn't explain the logic of making the decision BEFORE the result of the feasibility study was known. What sort of 'joined-up thinking' is that?

How do they expect people who do not have the experience of doing such a study to produce something that is adequate for the task? Leave alone the question of asking/instructing demoralised staff to actively participate in their own job loss? That is, of course, providing that the outcome were to prove that there was indeed a saving! On the other hand, if there were no saving there is a possibility that the staff could be accused of bias. All in all, not a satisfactory way of going about such an important analysis.

Concerning rumour, there has been very little allowed to creep into our observations on the board, since it would not benefit the argument against the decision to downsize the museum (however none of us are perfect, since this is such a contentious subject :huh:). Wherever possible things have been checked out to try to eliminate this occurrence.

As for thoughts about the current economic climate, and possible replacement building(s) of similar size to Broadfield House.

Firstly, I think we are all aware of that climate, either directly or through the media.

Secondly, the purpose of the exercise is to stop this ridiculous decision being made. Then, and only then, can we become constructive. The campaign must surely have demonstrated the strength of feeling about this, the ONLY, dedicated public glass museum in this country, which is recognised worldwide, by other museums, as well as collectors, researchers, writers, and, dare I mention, dealers.

The aim for the future of the museum has long been to increase its size to house all the facilities it has, so that the archive and store(s) are all under one roof along with the displays of glass - however, to that end the much favoured Himley Hall solution sadly never came about.

If the council wants everthing centred in one area it has long been my contention that part of the old Stuart's White House site would be the logical place as there are two buildings and space for car parking there that would quite probably fit the bill. I have found, through this campaign, that I am not the only person to consider this a possible solution (and yes, that would involve major capital outlay).

Had the council any nouce about them, they would see that there is a great deal of goodwill, not to mention knowledge and experience, out here that could be harnessed to good effect, but not until they see the light and understand the value and quality of what they hold in trust for generations to come -  whether local, national or international. This is the history of the area, that is of interest to a large audience.

While I'm about it I really don't think the huge experience and ability of the staff that have so ably kept Broadfield House running is as highly valued as it should be. It may be their job, but they're darn good at it.

As a final thought, planning to move any museum is a long term consideration involving a number of logistical factors that takes time. To try and cram this process into a small time frame is only likely to lead to distaster - just as in the same way if you don't prepare when you move house!!

Nigel

[Anne]

A friend of mine who is a county councillor in Cumbria tells me that over 60% of capital funding such as would be required for developing a new all-in-one museum/archive/library/visitor centre site can come from government or external sources (i.e. non-council) especially if job creation is involved, so the local council would not have to find all the funding from its own budget.

[aa]

I sent links to the Times letter to all Dudley councillors.

Cllr. Malcolm Davis replied thus:

"In response to your article in the Times, can I also say that we pay more than this to remove graffiti"