Chairman's Report 2006-07

Chairman's Report for 2006/07

by Cllr Allan Bird

My year as Chairman has seen a number of success for the Parish Council but has also left a number of challenges for the year ahead.

The Parish Council has very much had a focus in dealing with the problems of nuisance crime  which has the effect of making the residents, both young and old, feel insecure. In working towards this goal we have adopted the twin approach of on the one hand increasing the number of Police Community Support Officers to provide highly visible local policing and, where necessary, enforcement, and on the other hand trying to encourage and engage with local young people.

To this end the Council unanimously voted to increase the number of PCSOs and we have been very impressed with a number of initiatives put forward by the PCSOs to engage with our young people.
We held an extremely successful "shadow Parish Council meeting" in October and heard the views of young people from the Parish.  We are arranging to make this an annual event.
Some of the Council met with Insp Brian Heywood from Warrington West Neighbourhood Policing Unit, and with PCSOs and Parish Councillors from Penketh in an attempt to organize events for our young people.
We recognized the tireless efforts of Brenda Bradley over the "Our Wood" project, and I am sure Brenda would concede the real stars of the project are the school children of our Parish who put many hours of hard work into turning a wasteland into a National Award nominated amenity, especially the children of the Kids Committee.
The Parish Council has set aside funds in the 2007/08 budget to encourage Youth Projects, and through careful control of the budget once again did not require an increase to the annual precept.

During the year a number of Councillors suffered from long term ill health which had an impact in preventing the Council from moving forward as quickly as we would have liked in some key areas.  Sadly Cllr Tony Dodd died in May 2006.  Tony has been sadly missed.  Cllr Furlong and Cllr Lynn left the Council and I wish to personally thank them for their valuable contributions during their time at the Council.

On a brighter note we welcomed new Councillors Phil Hudson and Peter Ryan and in April co-opted Mr Harvey Leigh to join the Parish Council.  Much of the refurbishment of our Community Centres has now been completed.

Finally I would like to personally thank Parish Councillors for giving me the honour of Chairing the Council over the last 12 months, but in many ways the easy bit is making a decision and I would like to recognize the unstinting hard work of the Parish Clerk, Cheryl Wakefield, and her team in implementing the smooth running of our Parish Council.