Severus Hill

SEVERUS HILL AUGUST UPDATE

It seems a long while since the excitement and rush of the May bank holiday with the onset of spring around us. As over 1300 wonderful people caught the vision of securing Severus Hill for the future. Since then, carrying with us your amazing support and donations our action group have been approaching grant givers, charitable trusts, and potential business sponsors. We've had inspiring discussions with supportive academics and sought expert advise to better understand the true ‘value’ of this land—not just in financial terms, but for its priceless wildlife and natural heritage.

As we came into the key weeks of our exclusivity period at the end of July, we felt it important to heed this advice, while also recognising the communities ongoing responsibilities of taking on a site like Severus Hill. We submitted an offer for the land which reflected above the 'market value', but below the 'cost price' originally quoted to us in February 2024.

Stunning prints produced by local Artist, Jon Haste in support of our campaign. Prints available for purchase here - https://www.jonhaste.com/buy-prints/p/save-severus-hill

A COMMUNITY TOGETHER

What we have achieved together is to raise awareness of this hidden historic site to so many. We've had contact from people all over the UK who identify with the Severus story in their own locations, acknowledging the heart of our campaign. To ensure wildlife thrives in amongst our urban human ambitions. The ultimate aim of the campaign was to ensure the hill remained 'nature first'.

Regrettably, we have now heard back from our initial community bid. At this stage our offer was declined. The reasoning was partly based on a decision for the sale of the site to be paused. Yorkshire Water, as the sister company of Keyland, have decided to "conduct a feasibility study to see whether the site might have a role to play in providing future resilience to the water supply network in York." Whether this was impacted by infrastructure changes, the general election, or factors outside of our campaign, we’re unsure. This was an unexpected directional shift from the landowner’s decision in October 2023 to propose a private auction for the site. However, for now this means the site remains wild and secure. 

NEXT STEPS...

So where does this leave our campaign and the great community of support. Although a change in the original timeline of the campaign, we have continued conversations with Keyland the landowner. If possible, they would like to give the community bid preferential treatment in a second formal approach for the site, once Yorkshire Water have satisfied their surveys. We’re continuing these conversations and aiming to establish a timeline.

We're aware this is a change in the original campaigns outline but would ask you to keep in support of our efforts as we come to the end summer. While the conversations remain positive, we will ensure all donations remain in a secure account, which will allow us to continue these negotiations.

Image courtesy of local Friend of Severus Hill, Len Smith. Taken during structural work in 1984, showing view from the Water Tower towards York Minster.

IT’S NOT OVER...

If you would like to continue to advocate for the campaign, expressing your support for community ownership of Severus Hill and/or retention for the benefit of Nature and wildlife then we would encourage you to make contact with Yorkshire Waters public affairs team ([email protected]) feel free to CC in our email address ([email protected]). 

We hope this provides a helpful update, of course not the one we all would have liked, for now. We also appreciate the timeframe between updates, which has in part been due to holidays and people’s availability to reply. Going forward we will look to provide shorter and more concise updates on relevant developments on a more frequent basis. 

We are hugely grateful for your ongoing support and attentiveness to the campaign. At this stage we remain hopeful that the work and passion of us all will ensure that this special hill remains wild for many generations. That natures work on Severus Hill remains worth our time, support and efforts to protect.

Thank you for your ongoing support.

The Friends of Severus Hill