Late last week, the Clutha District Council announced it had bought an empty section and neighbouring building in Elizabeth St as a strategic investment in line with council's endowment land policy.
The $400,000 purchase price would be paid for from the council's land and buildings special fund and endowment land fund respectively, which meant no additional impact on rates.
Clutha Mayor Bryan Cadogan said that council ownership of the site
opened up potential, which the council would consult the public on when settling on the design of Balclutha's $2.6 million streetscape upgrade.
''It opens up potential,'' he said.
Hairworkz hair salon had a lease on the building until October 2016 and the council would be honouring it, lease income to go towards offsetting general rates as with other endowment land rental income.
During consultation on the Balclutha streetscape project last year, submitters raised the possibility of building a town centre on the empty section.
After considering all the submissions, the council agreed to develop options for enhancing Elizabeth St.
Since then, the opportunity had arisen for the council to buy the empty section and neighbouring building, Mr Cadogan said.
The council wanted to stress that no final decisions had been made on how, if at all, the section would figure in the detailed streetscape upgrade design, he said.
