Wednesday 3rd of March 2010
Bingo row explodes
A row has broken out over the future of a popular bingo club in the Somerset.
The beautiful town of Taunton is home to a huge venue with enough seats for 1,170 players, reports the Somerset County Gazette.
It has been holding exciting bingo games for 29 years and typically welcomes 2,100 people through the doors every week of the year.
However, a group of developers called Project Gaumont wants Taunton Deane Borough Council to reclassify the building as a general entertainment venue.
That would enable it to press ahead with plans to turn the bingo club into a multi-entertainment centre - proposals that have been backed by The Theatres Trust.
This week, Project Gaumont pitched ideas for the site to Taunton Deane Borough Council and are now awaiting a decision.
Bingo club manager hits out
Nevertheless, Monika Borska-Ulatowska, general manager of the bingo club, has wasted no time in dismissing the proposal as "pointless".
"Project Gaumont's plans seem to demean bingo as a waste of the building but they should talk to some of our customers to see how important it is to them," she said.
"We are not just a bingo hall - we are a social place for people to meet with friends."
There are plenty of examples of communities pulling together when local bingo clubs are put under threat.
Last year, lovers of bingo in the north east criticised the West Middlesbrough Neighbourhood Trust's plan to shut a popular community centre that hosted regular free bingo sessions.
In an inspiration to us all, dozens of angry residents picketed the trust's headquarters to call for its controversial proposal to be scrapped.
