Oswestry21

The Local Joint Committee met tonight at the Memorial Hall. An encouragingly full house and some good points raised - town identity and it’s function in the county core strategy seemed to be issues which raised questions and involve and engage. Download Core Strategy response form from the bottom of this page -> HERE

Some useful subjects raised in discussion - well worn chestnuts like current retail planning applications, Middleton Road traffic lights, as well as newer issues about town signage, market signage, town identity and promotion, the underplayed importance of Oswestrys ancient and more recent past, and town centre 20 mph speed limit (picked up by the Shropshire Star on Wednesday).  Oswestry Transition Towns received funding for their Green event on 350 day, Oct 24th, as did various other local organisations including Gatacre Allotments and The Project Group.

Nicky Young, Community Regeneration Officer reported positively on progress on empty shops project (now called Footfall) and there were presentations by Kairen Francis of Job Centre Plus with figures regarding unemployment and benefit claimants and by Richard Sheer of Shropshire Chamber of Commerce who wondered why there was so little engagement, affiliation and such a low take up of interest in Oswestry. Good question.

Needless to say dog crap featured large again and created a a brief but exciting exchange which seemed to include Cllr. Vince Hunt inviting concerned audience members on a short dog crap tour of Oswestry, and Inspector Jim Stafford of West Mercia Police explaining that hanging around waiting for a dog to crap irresponsibly was possibly not the most effective use of police time.

Better and more responsive Lo Jo Co than the last one with less patronisation, fewer flipcharts and no tabletop group excercises. Thankful for small mercies. If these events can start to develop a greater sense of openness and the semblance of some sort of trust between town council and electorate then they will be a useful initiative. There are a growing number of people in town from all angles and backgrounds who have ideas and thoughts and who would like to feel listened to and responded to with a real sense of engagement, and also to feel that their views are regarded as importantly as their votes.

The next Local Joint Committee (Lo Jo Co) will be held at the Memorial Hall Cambrian Room on Tuesday 22nd September at 7 p.m.

Items on the agenda  include applications to the community fund and developing the local economy. The meeting will also include the local PACT meeting (partners & communities together) for which the local police officers & community support officers will be in attendance to hear concerns and issues. A full agenda is available on the Shropshire Council website (www.shropshire.gov.uk). 

Oswestry Local Joint Committee will enable local people to have their say and get involved in decisions affecting their community. The meetings have a committee of unitary and town councillors drawn from local area, and will have time set aside for local people to raise issues. There is also a budget avilable to take action on local initiatives.

While these meetings are opportunities to raise local issues, it would seem useful to move them beyond the dog crap and wheelie bin misuse matters that the committee would seem happiest dealing with in a public forum, and start to create some genuine debate about decisions affecting the town. So here’s your chance.

Local Joint Committee…………. well, what can one say? Firstly the positives: that 25 or so members of the public should turn out to attend on the hottest evening of the year when they could all have been sipping something cool in their gardens is to be applauded. And that George Candler, Assistant Director Culture and Leisure and Arran Roberts, Corporate Performance Officer, both from Shropshire Council gave a sound and capable impression of being likely useful conduits of access to the Shirehall for local issues. Good also to have local police involvement and Community Support Officers present.

As for the rest……. well, the casual alacrity with which a Chairman and Vice Chairman were chosen, without any resort to a show of hands from the public who had bothered to attend served to remind us why there is distance and an uneasy sense of mistrust between elected Town Council members and the populace.

Confused explanation about the make up of the Community Chest, from which grants up to £2k to local projects and organisations are available was somewhat baffling. A sum of £16k was mentioned, and then there seemed to be a further £38k available, but not quite as available as the former figure, but this may have been misunderstood in the oddly explained details. Suggestions coming forward from the Town Council and Shropshire Council representatives as to what to do with the £38k seemed to be concerned with cleaning up paving and more hanging baskets - there seems to be an public impression that such things are already part of the Town Councils remit and come out of council tax payers money as it is. And frankly there is a feeling that if no one never sees yet another hanging basket in town again it would be a blessed relief. Some clarity about the make up and intention of the Community Chest would be welcome.

There was also some difficulty in establishing, from a question from the audience, what exactly is the Town Council’s commitment to the Powis Hall market over the next 10-15 years. A simple question, but one that was left totally unanswered. Instead we were vaguely informed about Town Council advertising of the Powis Hall Market, and when further pressed, councillors admitted that they didn’t know what the advertising budget was, nor exactly how it was spent. When asked how we could find out “680222, 680222″ was shouted from the panel.

There are some issues here about clarity, intention and transparency, which if the Local Joint Committee is going to work well, seem to need to be addressed. While dog fouling and wheelie bins contribute to the concerns of the local electorate, the LoJoCo should not be used as a convenient display of Council “consultation” with their electors by solely dealing with these ever present minor irritants, but should also become a forum for wider issues in which accountability, transparency and a genuine sense of partnership all play a part. It is only in this way that the electorate can feed up issues beyond dog crap and littering in the park to the Shirehall.

Despite these concerns, this could be a useful and productive forum, and another useful method of alerting the Town Council to town issues and of  having Oswestry’s voice heard further up the line in Shirehall.

Incidentally, I phoned “680222″ and enquired about the advertising budget and expenditure for Powis Hall and was put through to the Finance Office, which informed me that year 09-10 the budget is £1k but couldn’t elaborate on how this was being spent as it was too early in the financial year. Year 08-09 the budget was £3848 due to the production of bags advertising the market - which, reportedly, traders had to pay for or contribute towards in some way. Powis Hall has apparently been advertised in the Star, Tizer, local radio and market trade magazines and websites.