My ward colleague, John Holland and I attended a meeting of the Warwick Area Forum this evening. The purpose of the meeting (I think)is to allow various councillors, council officers, residents and police the opportunity to discuss and debate priorities and issues about Warwick.
Tonight was fairly well-attended, they said. But given that there are 30,000 people living in Warwick I'd remark that the attendance was very low. Every face was white, over 30 and involved in the community in some way, I'd say. It is open to all but I'd suggest that 6pm is a difficult time for parents sorting out young children, people without transport, older people, people who work, in fact, probably most people. In fairness, the people who were there were asked about this but we were all clearly able to get there!
Anyway, tonight's business was fairly unsurprising. The Sgt for the Community Police Team gave an excellent report on community policing, and pledged to do better at communicating with residents. Issues raised by residents included anti-social behaviour by some young people hanging out by the train station, speeding and theft.
An officer from the Council's Community Safety Team told us about a volunteer community speed watch initiative, which funds a minimum of 6 volunteers to provide speed watches. Like other parts of Dave's Big Society, they have struggled to get enough volunteers to make this work.
There was discussion about 3 grant applications from communitty groups. The forum has £8,000 to allocate and tonight there was an application to fund a youth arts project. It seemed like a deserving, and exciting project for youth in the town. Unsurprisingly, there was a disappointing response from two of the Conservative County Councillors who spoke negatively about the application. Luckily the majority of attendees voted to allocate some money, and we meet next week to decide how much.
I picked up strong feelings about the closure of the fire station, and this, and other Conservative cuts, were raised in connection with the Local Plan. Whichever option for growth is decided for Warwick, we need to make sure that the current infrastructure improves, as even the option for low growth involves additional housing and development. Oddly, some of the Conservatives spoke against the decisions made by their own groups. Bit misleading for folk, I think.
