The bidders short-listed for Ventnor’s Winter Gardens, who presented to the council last week, have been informed of the council’s decision.
The preferred bidder is the Robert Thompson team and his financial backers behind The Hambrough. VentnorBlog understands that the panel, who made the decision, were unanimous.
The panel that made the decision consisted two VTC councillors, IW councillor Susan Scoccia and four council officers.
Speaking to Robert Thompson, he told VB, “It’s very exciting for us to be named as preferred bidder. There’s still a huge amount to do in terms of negotiation of all of the terms with the council and things like the planning permission needed to be sorted out.
VB asked Robert what was needed to be done. He said, “We will be refurbishing and upgrading the building – building the dining venues and entertainment venue. The upgrading of the auditorium is absolutely key to it.
“It will be multi-use and we want it to be a credit to the town. It could be up and running as soon as 2012.”
VB spoke to John Allen from the Ventnor Winter Gardens Rescue Group, “We feel with gave it our best shot. We gave a good presentation and feel that we were given a fair hearing. We don’t feel that we could have done better.
“Our plans were to have the building open by July this year and to have restored the building sympathetically.”
More details shortly
