Parks Councillor Swindon - What have I been doing?

I've been asked to think of the three main issues that keep croping up from residents to myself across Park North and Park South so here goes, in no particular order;-

Housing Repairs
Every week I have one or two calls or emails about repairs needing to be done, or that have been done but not properly so I have built up good realitiuonships with the housing team on this.

Anti-social Behaviour
Again, most weeks I hear from at least one person who has fallen victim to ASB and is unhappy.
We have seen some results, around the Welcombe Stores and now with the new talking CCTV at Cavendish Square, but it remains an issue. I can't help but be concerned that things are going going to get worse with the £200,000 cut in the youth service budget, they seemed pushed enough beforehand. We will see

Parking
The estate was built before everyone had one car let alone two so not surprisingly there is not enough parking. We have unhappy residents getting tickets as they try to park their car where they can see it.
We have parking promised ie.for Studland Close and Whitbourne Avenue but it's not here yet and it is a continuous frustration for us all.

These are the three issues as I see them, what are yours?

Elsewhere I've just come from a very productive Forum meeting which talked about the new way community services may be led through clusters; connecting people, connecting places. There were huge concerns as to the lack of consultation on this so far and about basing things around secondary schools. The group is going to write and express the groups concerns and ask for someone to come and explain and consult with the group.

Swindon in the National news! I've had colleagues at work ask me about it and my mum phoned and wanted to know more about...Speed Cameras!
What to say you've probably read an artcle or two about it, if not try here & here. My view for what it's worth is; Yes they do cost and yes Swindon does not get the money directly back from the cameras in its boundarys. But, I prefer it this way so that cameras are placed to prevent accidents not to raise revenue.
The Camera along Queens drive has been out of action for some time and I have had residents phone to tell me they have concerns as cars are racing along at night and too fast even during the day. There have been only a few accidents, car collided with bus and I recall a young boy being killed further down Queens Drive a few years back. But do we want to wait until there is another accident before we get the camera working again?

Seems to be if you don't speed you don't get a fine so no reason to complain about cameras. I can't buy this it's a tax on the motorists for that reason, don't speed and it won't be you. It has been me twice so I'm not able to preach to much on this!

At least there are plenty of traffic lights along Queens Drive to slow cars down. There are plans to put in another crossing where there is an underpass at the moment. This I think will slow cars down along an area where there is nothinhg at the moemnt, near the speed camera.

Anyway, it's not all speed cameras, elsewhere, I heard news of a succesful arrest of two offenders accused of being up to no good on Cavendish Square. They've been to court and charged, so things are happening.

I've been busy with meetings, yesterday was licensing and housing advisory. At licensing we were looking at Taxi charges. At the moment you start paying more once the total cost is at £11.20, as the rate goes up. We voted for that increase in rate to come in only after £16.20. This means those who live on the outskirts of Swindon, ie Highworth, Abbey Meads etc will not be so penalised. The majority of Taxi drvers seemed to support that too. We also agreed that Taxis should not have over tinted windows for everyones safety. I did also learn that Taxi driver fares are negoitiable so maybe worth a try next time you are in one!

Housing Advisory; one of my favourite committees, looked at where more residents parking will be put in this year. I pointed out the Studland still hadn't happened two years on so maybe we should keep an eye to make sure that what we agree should happen, happens. That was agreed. We also looked at untidy gardens. Since the pilot scheme started (as mentioned in an earlier blog entry)there have been
145 referrals
45 of those are now resolved & were so within two weeks.
119 are still ongoing.

So I've been busy, there's also been phonecalls and meetings with residents, a meeting with the Director of Housing, and Labour Party door knocking too.

In answer to my question about youth services coming to the Reuben George as Cllr Cherry stated, the reply I got was " There is no SBC youth activity at planned at Reuben George Hall Cavendish Square at this time..."

Schools break up soon so if I go quiet it's because my teenagers don't allow me to get near the PC!

If you missed it the public meeting re Cavendish square was on Tuesday. I was late as I had governors first but I'll fill you in as best as I can.

The two main issues were unsurprisingly anti-social behaviour around and on the Square and parking.
Annoyingly the person would was in charge of the parking situation was not there So there was little info able to be given.

The big news in that Stage 3 may not be happening as we thought it would, here is a reply I had to a recent question on that -
"You are correct in saying that there is some doubt now whether the final phase (Phase 3) of the new shopping centre will be carried out, at least in the original expected timescale.

The recent market uncertainty and the "credit crunch" however has come at a particularly bad time, and there is of course a real possibility that the funder's pre-letting criteria will not be achieved. In these circumstances the developer is considering undertaking the Phase 3 demolitions (the existing Co-Op unit and the Cock Robin pub) and resurfacing the area, and then leaving site. If the pre-lets are still not achieved the developer would come back in January / February 2009 and complete the Mall and covered walkway, although the building of the Phase 3 units would remain in doubt, until at least the funding requirements were satisfied

There were some concerns that without the new shops, there would be no covered mall but these appear to be unfounded. Likewise we are assured that there will be CCTV, and there is also plans afoot to bring in CCTV with a camera placed on the post near the church, this would be helpful. Everyone is working hard to see things happen ASAP.

Meanwhile some youths were caught grafitting (not sure how to spell that ) when the shops used their radios to communicate with each other and the Police, good to see action is being taken. We are encouraged to continue reporting all incidents however small and however frustrated we get that things don't appear to change. The number of incidents matters when resources are allocated. I will continune to work with the Police and the team in SBC to see things improve as they have done at Welcombe Stores.

There was a bit of a row when Cllr Cherry your new Tory Councillor explained how he had secured youth services to occupy Reuben George (news to me but then if your not in with the Tories you don't hear much) some had concerns about that, but more had concerns when hew said how he'd arranged for wardens to ticket bad parking around the Square and those who park illegally on the road but on the grass would be OK. Interesting

Elswhere I've been busy catching up on casework, following up longstanding issues which really frustrate me, and it's my daughters prom (how expensive are these ) so she's been keeping me busy sewing on bits to her dress, & taking her to have her eye brows waxed - I didn't even know they did that, isn't a form of torture

I'm off to see housing tomorrow, put faces to names and find out more about how it all works, I'll feed back next week. Have a good week.