Alert boxes

In October the three East Dulwich Liberal Democrat Councillors Cllr Richard Thomas, Jonathan Mitchell and I allocated £25,000 to help fight shop crime in East Dulwich. This was the number one priority for investment from the local Crime Prevention Officer.

Just before Christmas another 100 traders in East Dulwich signed up for Alert boxes – a proven method to reduce shop crime by typically 57%. The Alert Boxes have been programmed and will be delivered during mid January.

Big thanks to the East Dulwich Safer Neighbourhood Team and council officers nad project managers for making this happen – Andrea Allen, Sarah De Souza and all the traders who have joined in the scheme.

Mobile Operators…propaganda?

As a councillor I receive lots of post – typically 12 inches high a week and about 200-400 emails on a typical week. Boy does it take a lot of time to ensure I read everything that could be useful for me and the residents in East dulwich.

One newsletter caught my eye and thankfully I read it cover to cover – the Mobile Operators Association newsletter. It started by saying how much money has been spent on research proving mobiles and base stations are safe. It then talked about how every public authority in UK has been sent a list of all the mobile operators combined plans. Then buried on later pages how research so far indicates more medical research is needed to be sure.

1stly. Checking with Southwark officers they haven’t received such combined mobile operators plans.

2ndy. Why not state this last part about more medical research being needed on page 1. Could it be they just don’t expect many councillors to read that far into the newsletter.

How cynical is that?

Be a Streetleader

I normally cycle to work. Due to a mishap while playing with my children I’m using buses this week. On a bike you whizz along. With a bus commute you get time to contemplate as it’s a much slower way to travel.

So what to do on a bus journey. Today I just couldn’t help myself but email graffiti problems that need be fixed. I reported eight in just one journey via the Streetleader scheme.

Inspecting over 650km of roads every day is just not possible by the council but if the community keep an open eye and report problems they get fixed thsat much quicker.

If you’d like to be a Streetleader as well, call Dave Taylor on 020 7525 2455 or email him at dave.taylor@southwark.gov.uk

New Grove Vale library….

Eighteen months ago I approached developer St.Aidan’s who’d applied for planning permission to redevelope the Dulwich Garden Centre, 18-22 Grove Vale. Personally it’s sad to see the demise of a a garden centre – that’s where we buy our plants from for our garden. But if it is going to be redeveloped then I wanted to ensure that any scheme benefited the local community in East Dulwich.  So I proposed the current charming but pokey Grove Vale library be moved to a proposed new development across the road on a peppercorn rent. I attended the previous schemes planning appeal in January’07 to help ensure it didn’t proceed as it was an ugly pastiche with no community benefit.

The new scheme, progressing through the planning process, includes 24 flats and a new 230m2 Grove Vale community library. The current Grove Vale library is only 144m2. So the new library would be big enough for school classes from Dog Kennel Hill, Goose Green and other local schools to visit, hold adult education, have lots more study desks and computers and be a much bigger asset to the community. If approved it would be on a peppercorn rent for circa 125 years. The would release money that would enable it to be open much more than the current four days per week.

My calculations show this as having a potential net present value of £2,000,000 for East Dulwich.

Still quite a few issues to work through but I’m really excited by how Southwark Council Officers have been able, working with a developer, to get this scheme submitted. Hopefully it will be approved in December or January.

Watch this space for updates.