£80,000 funding for Yorkshire Coast Sight Support charity approved by Scarborough Council

Scarborough Council has agreed to award up to £80,000 of funding to Yorkshire Coast Sight Support’s community-led housing project.

The project aims to address the lack of accessible housing that is available to visually impaired people in the borough by buying and adapting a property to the required standards.

The charity will cover half the costs of the project which is expected to cost up to £160,000, with £123,000 set aside for the purchase of a two-bedroom ground-floor flat.

Colin Eastwood, manager of Yorkshire Coast Sight Support, welcomed the approval of the funding for the “excellent project” and said it would allow the charity “to focus on housing needs in community areas”.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, he said: “Big thanks to the local authority officers who worked with us on the project.

"It has been quite a long, arduous project going through Covid.”

The grant was approved at a meeting of Scarborough Council’s Cabinet on Tuesday October 18, with members voting unanimously in favour of the proposal.

Yorkshire Coast Sight Support has a charity shop on Falsgrave Road in Scarborough, which also has a two-bedroom flat above it.

Originally, the charity had planned on renovating and making that property suitable for a visually impaired person.

However, this year the charity was “unexpectedly bequeathed a sizeable sum of money” which has allowed it to search for a more suitable, ground-floor property.

Speaking at the cabinet meeting, Cllr Steve Siddons, the council leader, said: “I think this is a really worthwhile scheme and I’m appalled that there are so few, if not almost non-existent houses available for people who need sight support.”

Mr Eastwood, the manager, said the charity hopes to have the new property renovated and ready for an occupant “within the next six to eight months”.

The Royal National Institute for the Blind has estimated that with an ageing population, the number of visually impaired people in the borough could rise to 5,900 by 2030.

Yorkshire Coast Sight Support is a local charity, which supports visually impaired people across the Scarborough area.

It has been in existence for more than 80 years.