VOLUNTEERS have been given a final cash boost to reopen Cogges Manor Farm Museum in Witney, but have been told they are now on their own.

Oxfordshire County Council and West Oxfordshire District Council are set to hand over £105,000 for building works at the Church Lane tourist attraction, which County Hall closed in 2009 to save cash.

Volunteer-run Cogges Heritage Trust will run the farm and encourage food, horticultural and craft businesses to pay to use the Cogges brand to help keep it afloat.

Wedding receptions and a “free school” are also among proposals for the site, expected to reopen this summer.

The county council has pledged £320,000 over two years in running costs. But it has cut a planned £250,000 building grant to £55,000 because of the economic downturn, asking West Oxfordshire District Council to put in an extra £50,000.

The county council’s cabinet yesterday agreed to grant the site’s lease to the new Cogges Heritage Trust. The district council will be asked to agree its contribution today.

Trust chairman Judy Niner said: “We are very confident that we have looked at a range of options and we are positive it definitely has the potential to succeed.

“It is a huge challenge.”

The farm-themed museum cost the council £240,000 a year. It closed in August 2009, despite attracting 30,000 annual visitors.

Ms Niner said: “It was costing the county council a great deal of money every year, and we have had to take a very fresh look at what Cogges will be and ought to offer people, and how we can make it financially viable.

“We have done everything we can, but there is a lot of hard work ahead for all of us to make it work.

“There’s no doubt its success is very dependent on a lot of people pitching in and helping to bring the vision to life.”

The council cash should last two years, she said.

The council said “there will be no subsequent revenue contribution” though it will be leased at a peppercorn rent.

Ms Niner said the trust wanted a “Cogges family of businesses” brand to encourage firms to set up at the site and to pay to use the Cogges name.

A smallholder will also return to Cogges, keeping it as a working farm, and staffing costs will be kept to a minimum by relying on volunteers, she said.

Other plans include a farm shop, a catering arm, and wedding receptions.

Ms Niner said: “This is an opportunity for local people to start businesses that would like to reflect the values of Cogges, creating jobs and creating revenue.”

Among the groups in discussion with the trust over moving to the site are home-schooling parents who want to run a free school there.

The trust may apply for Lottery funding at a later date.

Oxfordshire County Council’s director of social and community services, John Jackson, said the council had worked “extremely hard” to come up with a sustainable future for the site.

District council leader, Barry Norton said: “As a site of national and local importance, the plan put forward preserves the farm as a community asset with heritage at its heart.”