Council puts city venue on the market

Wiltshire Council is searching for an operator for entertainment venue Salisbury City Hall.

The 1,255-capacity building, built in 1936, closed in 2020 due to the pandemic and was subsequently used as a vaccination clinic. The council-owned venue was put on the market eight weeks ago, with real estate company Savills asked to identify organisations that could enter a lease for a period of up to 35 years.

The council’s website says a stipulation for prospective operators is that the venue remains an entertainment venue. 

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“Should appropriate operators be recommended and one appointed after this process they would be responsible for the running of the venue, but we would retain overall ownership,” the council has said.

Savills is expected to report to the council in September, with a final decision on a leaseholder laying solely with the council’s cabinet.

An open letter from Friends of Salisbury City Hall, which has previously campaigned for the venue to open sooner, has called on the cabinet to select a suitable leaseholder “not simply on short-term economic grounds but more importantly, on their ability to deliver tangible social/cultural value to Salisbury and the wider region for the medium and long term”.

“The long lease for City Hall to 2060 represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to find a leaseholder and partner who is culturally aligned and complements the city,” the letter continues.

“An organisation able to create not just an economically viable and vibrant entertainment venue but also a team who will respect the history and current wishes of the citizens. Seeing City Hall as a multi-purpose civic hall that supports the arts and communities across Salisbury and the wider region. As originally intended.”

Cultural strategy

The listing has coincided with the approval of Wiltshire’s first ever cultural strategy, covering 2024-2030, which was voted through by councillors in July.

Partly funded by Arts Council England, the strategy has three core principles embedded across the strategy – empower others, environment and access – and a series of core objectives, including increasing engagement in art and culture, creating a diverse creative workforce and using art and culture to attract tourism and revitalise town centres.

The strategy was passed with 54 votes in favour, while nine councillors voted against and 14 abstained. Critics of the strategy said the Conservative-led council does not have the capacity to deliver it.

“If we get through 10% of this over the next 12 months, I will be absolutely astonished,” the council’s Liberal Democrat leader Ian Thorn told the BBC.

Friends of Salisbury City Hall have also voiced concern over the strategy and how City Hall will fit into it. The group urged the council to “communicate clearly and transparently about how their recently approved Cultural Strategy will be applied in the selection process” of a leaseholder for City Hall.

Wiltshire Council told Arts Professional that it would confirm more details on the outcome of the work Savills is carrying out soon and that if a prospective operator for City Hall is identified from the process, the next stage will be negotiations.

Richard Clewer, Leader of Wiltshire Council, added, “We want City Hall to be a thriving entertainment venue, so any tenant will need to share this vision to take it into a new era.

“Our recently developed Cultural Strategy has now been formally adopted, and it seeks to support a better connected, stronger creative and cultural sector – and a venue like City Hall, with its rich heritage and history, will play a key role in that.

"The strategy will underpin all our cultural work going forward and has clear aims and objectives to ensure we achieve what we’ve set out. City Hall will complement the overall cultural offer of Salisbury and the overall investment in the city.”