This is a photograph of former guest house ‘Normaz’, 19 Aquarium Street. Residents in the vicinity are expressing concern about the alleged involvement of Pennaf/Clwyd Alyn Housing Association in the recent purchase of this and other properties. Their fears are understandable, given the association’s record of housing people with behavioural problems in the town centre and west end.[As an occupier of a Clwyd Alyn property for the elderly I am aware that not everything the association does is bad.]
Behind the association’s current wave of buying is a massive amount of money from Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) for regenerating Rhyl. Denbighshire County Council is involved, and this is another unhelpful factor in public relations. Residents feel that many times in the past they have been lied to, ripped off, sold down the river and stabbed in the back by Clwyd Alyn or Denbighshire or both.
The WAG officer in charge of the scheme has explained to me that Clwyd Alyn is purchasing and managing the properties but shall not be given complete control. He says that, after public consultation about housing issues, the new acquisitions are to be refurbished, or remodelled (e.g. from flatlets and bedsits into bigger units) or in some cases demolished.
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