THE GARRISON IS synonymous with horse racing but a local credit union is in no hurry to redevelop a property it owns in the historic area.
For the last few years, officials of The Light & Power Employees Co-operative Credit Union Ltd. (LPECCUL) have been scratching their heads trying to figure out what to do with the Horseshoe Manor property, which is named among the listed buildings within Historic Bridgetown and its Garrison.
The holding is valued at about $1.5 million but it will cost between $5 million and $7 million to renovate. Having already spent about $350 000 including fees for an architect, quantity surveyors, engineers, and ground testing, LPECCUL has put the project on the backburner.
Beyond financial considerations, their decision was informed by concerns about a reduced uptake for properties in the Garrison area.
In the cooperative’s annual report issued to members ahead of their annual general meeting about two months ago, LPECCUL’s board of directors said they “deferred plans for commencement of the refurbishment of the Horseshoe Manor property due to the anticipated cost factor, as well as the depressed commercial real estate market”.
BARBADOS BUSINESS AUTHORITY learnt that the management and members of the credit union were so concerned about what to do with the property that they held a special general meeting on the matter last December 14 in the Barbados Light & Power Company Limited’s, The Christie Conference Room.
At the end of that meeting, a motion “to halt the renovations to Horseshoe Manor property and assess the market conditions with the possibility of selling” was moved and approved by a majority vote.
According to the minutes of the special meeting, members were told that the credit union bought the Horseshoe Manor property in the late 1990s and it was tenanted until about four years ago when it became derelict.
“The sections of Horseshoe Manor that were in living conditions were tenanted. The tenants were given notice and the credit union embarked on a project to re-develop the property. That was around 2007-2008 when the economy was doing well and the offshore business sector was thriving,” the report stated.
“In the initial stages we undertook to do some refurbishment and the budget was set at $2.5 million.”
It is now a case of wait-and-see for the Horseshoe Manor property which cannot be demolished and its original architecture must be maintained. (SC)