Improve our parks and open spaces - Ideas wanted!

Having extracted loads of cash from local developers through 'section 106' agreements, the money is now burning a hole in the Council's pockets, and they are looking for ideas on how to spend it.

This money comes from cash payments made to the Council before planning permission will be granted, in theory to 'mitigate the effects of the development' but in reality is more like a 'developers tax' ultimately paid for by purchasers of new properties in Cambridge. Some of the payments are to mitigate the fact that insufficient open space has been provided on a new development, and the cash can then be used to 'improve' or provide facilities on existing open spaces.

Notwithstanding the fact that you can't really compensate for a lack of open space (i.e. overdevelopment) of a new site by enhancing existing open space, this does give an opportunity for the many recreation areas around Coleridge to benefit from some investment.

The Council says:

"We are seeking ideas from members of the public, councillors and stakeholders for potential new recreation and open space projects in the city, as part of the council's  'Improve your Neighbourhood' scheme.

If you would like to suggest an idea, please go to the website at this link to see how the scheme works and what type of projects can be funded:http://www.cambridge.gov.uk/ccm/content/community-and-living/local-communities/improve-your-neighbourhood.en"

The weblink gives examples of the type of schemes the Council has in mind - if you have any ideas, be in touch with the Council, and don't forget to let you local Conservative team know as well!

Why Government is so expensive, part II

A few days ago I wrote about why government is so expensive, and why the Conservatives are right that it is not only better to reduce the cost of government (rather than increase taxes) to fix Labour's debt crisis, it is mandatory. I said:

 'Partnership working' is another recent entry in public sector buzzword bingo - in theory, great, it means (I think) public bodies working together to try running services better. In practice, there are pots of money available from government for their pet projects, whole teams of project managers and press officers producing plans to demonstrate that the right boxes are being ticked to show people are working together - along with endless meetings and powerpoint presentations taking up vast amounts of time, and involving senior public sector employees

As if by magic, an example turns up. The Community Alcohol Partnership from the humble Councillor's point of view is simply the police working with trading standards to tackle underage drinking, and they had been working in Coleridge as part of a pilot project. They visited places like Coleridge Rec on a friday or saturday night in response to complaints about under-age drinking, so the police can confiscate alcohol and contact parents as necessary, and trading standards can work with the shops who sold the alcohol to find out how it came into the possession of under 18s, and try to stop those sales in future.

All very sensible - except all seemed to have gone quiet from the community alcohol partnership, so this week I made enquiries as to what had happened to it - here is the reply:

As you had observed there has been less activity in recent weeks.

There are a couple of reasons for this.  Firstly, the Adult Alcohol Commissioning Group are now acting as the CAP Board to oversee the roll-out of all CAPs in the county (including the existing ones) This measure was put in place earlier this year primarily to address some of the issues that had arisen. For example, they found that, without any formal structure or agreements, the representation of some partners on the working group changed several times - and some new representatives did not consider CAP a priority. This made it difficult to undertake any activities requiring input of certain partners.

The CAP Board will oversee and commit resources to the CAP (i.e. influence the CAP on the ground - making sure the working group has the necessary resources to deliver the relevant activities) and by getting formal agreements signed by each partner (SLAs) of their contribution to the scheme. A Terms of Reference for the working group and the SLAs will be drafted shortly and we hope to have these signed ASAP.

In addition, there is currently an evaluation of the CAP's work by xxx Ltd which will identify how the CAP can be improved as they move forward. It is anticipated that some of the aforementioned formal agreements and structures will be among the suggested improvements going forward. Once the evaluation report is published the CAP Board can consider the findings and influence how the CAP continues in the city.

And to think that if you believe Labour, it is vital we have so much government and any cost cutting would immediately impact doctors, nurses and teachers on the front line - absolute nonsense. One Conservative policy I really like is the idea of a directly elected police chief. Someone local residents can hold accountable, and to thom they could say that they just want the police to work with other groups to tackle the problem of underage drinking in their neighbourhood, and if they can't do it without a commissioning group, an oversight board, contracts, service level agreements, and a consultants report, they won't be in charge for very much longer...

Totally disgusting

I've just had to report to the council that there is excrement at the top of one of the slides on the play area at Coleridge Rec, after a tip off from a local resident. Hopefully it will be cleared up urgently.

It is just possible that someone let their dog into the play area (which they shouldn't have done) and then didn't realise what had happened, but it does seem unlikely - leaving the totally disgusting possibility that this has been allowed to happen intentionally - words fail me.

UPDATE: Had the following back from the Council -

"I am writing to update you on measures taken to remove fouling to the children's slide at Coleridge Recreation Ground play area reported on Monday 14th December. The background is that an incident was reported to the Customer Service Centre, logged at 12.11pm, outlining fouling within the play area. This report was passed to Streetscene electronically and our mobile cleaner/graffiti team attended the site within the hour.

The graffiti team member reported that fouling was present at the top of the children's slide. The operative also stated that this was most likely caused by accidental fouling from a younger child. He did not feel that the fouling was in any way deliberate and he has considerable experience of dealing with incidents of this nature.

The play area is inspected daily, however on Monday the 14th this inspection was not planned until after 2pm and I can confirm that the inspection was undertaken by which time the play area had been cleaned."

More events on Coleridge Rec?

The Council is finally making progress on looking at the capacity of the City's central parks to host events, and to put limits on the numbers of events of a particular size that will be allowed to avoid too much damage to the parks and complaints from local residents, and will shortly go out to wider consultation with proposals.

One effect of this will be a focus on the less central parks and open spaces, where there may be underused capacity to host events. Coldhams Common, for example, could potentially host more major or large events.

In Coleridge, there are currently no formally approved events held on the Recreation Ground, although it has been suggested that the rec could potentially be used for small festival type events, (similar to the Cherry Hinton Festival or Arbury Carnival - subject to people coming forward to organise a new event obviously!), but there is the question of whether any disruption to the rec or local residents would outweigh the benefits of having more local events.

If anyone has any suggestions as to whether more events on the rec would be appreciated locally, and if so what types, or any other suggestions as to how the rec can be improved, please be in touch.