Villages set for upgrades through £200k funding

Plans to use £200,000 of government funding to improve villages in part of Staffordshire are set to be approved.

South Staffordshire Council’s Village Centre Action Plan was proposed to help pay for projects aimed at enhancing village centres and high streets.

These would include improvements to public car parks and shop fronts as well as support for marketing campaigns to boost tourism.

If approved, the council would allow parish councils and community groups to bid for grants from the £200,000 funding.

The money would come out of the authority’s £3.82m allocation of the Shared Prosperity Fund which must be used by the end of the 2024-25 financial year.

A report set to go before the district council’s cabinet on 10 September said the authority had consulted with eight of the area’s key village centres: Billbrook, Brewood, Codsall, Great Wyrley, Kinver, Penkridge, Perton and Wombourne.

Among the recommendations in the report were calls to make villages more accessible through improvements to public car parks.

The report said there was “strong interest” in allowing parish councils and community groups to apply for the funding.

It recommended cabinet members approve the proposal as a “short, medium and long-term plan to further improve our village centres”.

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