City council to recruit manager to regenerate Oxfordshire centres

A manager is to be appointed to drive the regeneration of towns in Oxfordshire.

Oxford City Council is leading a £1.875 million OxLEP-funded scheme, which covers the city and county’s four district councils, and includes converting vacant buildings into a variety of uses.

Now the city council has advertised for someone to oversee the project on a contract of up to one year. The new manager, who will report to OxLEP, will lead a collaborative working group.

The scheme – Oxfordshire Town Centres Renaissance Programme – is funded from OxLEP’s £8.4m share of the Government’s Getting Building Fund.

A vacant building at 1-3 George Street in Oxford city centre is one which will be brought back into use as a co-working space for start ups.

The programme is one of seven within the fund which will create a total of almost 500 new jobs.

Rob Panting, communications manager at OxLEP, said: “The recruitment of this position – supporting Oxford’s eventual economic re-emergence from the Covid-19 pandemic – is excellent news.

“As the Local Enterprise Partnership for Oxfordshire, we will continue to play a vitally important role for the county moving forward, securing investment that enables new opportunities that benefit the county’s businesses for many years to come.”

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