Sheep will continue to be a feature of Cooper’s Meadow now that Marlborough Town Council has agreed grazing can go ahead in spring after a Community Asset Transfer.

The meadow will come back under the ownership of the town council after it was agreed at an area board meeting on Tuesday last week.

The issue was brought to the Marlborough Area Board after a debate about the ownership during a town council meeting in December.

Town council estate manager Richard Beale was asked to devise a management plan for the meadow, leased to the town council by the old Ken-net District Council in 1987.

Concerns were raised that there might be legal issues around some aspects of the plan, including the grazing rights, arising from the original lease terms.

The area board heard a proposal for the Community Asset Transfer to be shared between Marlborough Town Council and other groups.

But the town council has a 99-year lease with 70 years left and if ownership was transferred to other groups it would have to wait until the lease ran out to take over the freehold.

A Community Asset Tran-sfer was agreed unanimously by the board and the legal process of handing over the land should be completed in two to three months.

Mayor Marian Hannaford Dobson said: “We will be setting up meetings to learn how residents would like to see this land used.”