A crisis-hit community centre that ran up debts of £70,000 is making a fresh start - by employing a qualified manager to run its revamped bar.

An investigation into Donnington Community Centre, Townsend Square, Oxford, uncovered financial turmoil and failed council monitoring. The centre's bar was closed last March to protect volunteers from becoming liable for the debt.

City councillor Bill Baker, the centre's new chairman, said: "I think the chief problem was that when you have inexperienced and unqualified people handling hundreds of pounds a week, if they have no experience of doing VAT, tax, insurance and bookkeeping, you are likely to get into problems immediately. All they do is snowball.

"We have taken that problem away from the volunteers, the amateurs, the local people from the community association."

An investigation by David Taylor, Oxford City Council's monitoring officer, detailed a series of loans to the centre, from the council and two breweries since 1987, and a failure to provide audited accounts for two years. Now the total debt of £71,094 has been reduced to £59,000, which includes a £50,000 loan to buy the building, and bills are being paid. The centre no longer rents an office at below-market rates to Labour councillor Bryan Keen to store printing equipment. He paid rent of £100 a quarter, which Cllr Baker said should have been increased to £200 a quarter to keep pace with inflation.

Cllr Keen's The office and a room below it have been earmarked for a youth club.

The bar was shut down in March. Now a qualified bar manager, Phil Radbourne, will run the bar finances. The bar reopened on Saturday.

Cllr Baker said: "Phil has been in the brewery business for a long time and he has brought a lot of enthusiasm." The revamped centre has been renamed Donnington Community and Social Club. Now the community association is only involved in hirin the hall.

In his report earlier this year, Mr Taylor recommended paying independent accountants to do routine audits every year and offering volunteers at community centres training in book-keeping and finance. He also said every community association must submit audited accounts each year.

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