Councillor Crosby - Gallagher Park and Other Stories.

[Bill Crosby]

On 29 June, I sat on a Licensing and Regulatory Sub-Committee regarding a number of cases involving taxis.  The panel was made up of three Councillors plus a reserve (me, as it was my first one) just in case one member declared an interest and withdrew.  This, of course, happened in the first case we heard so I was thrown in at the deep end!  It was an enjoyable experience but one taken very seriously as ultimately you could be deliberating on people’s livelihoods.

On Monday 3 July, I attended a Community Safety Meeting at West Hartford Fire Station.; this is basically a meeting with Councillors and community leaders from the South East of the county in which issues of crime and anti-social behaviour are discussed.

That same evening, I was invited to attend a meeting of the Friends of Gallagher Park.  At this meeting I got the impression that this group was floundering. They had no chair or treasurer and the secretary was only there under sufferance.  In my opinion, Gallagher Park is a vast untapped resource with loads of potential for recreational activity so, in order to try and give the committee new impetus, new officers were elected.  I am the new Chair, Dawn has kindly offered to step in as treasurer and Keith Dalton will be the Secretary.  We are looking for ideas as to what people would like to see in the park so, if anyone has any ideas (especially those people younger than the author) then please let me know. Following this meeting we have started a Friends of Gallagher Park Facebook page.  Please feel free to join and submit any ideas, stories, photographs you might want to share concerning the park and any events etc that you would like to see there if possible.

On Tuesday, I was at the East Bedlington Parish Council Meeting where I raised the subject of the omission of Sleekburn from the Bedlington/Cramlington/Seaton Valley LAC.  The Council agreed with me that Sleekburn is part of Bedlington and as such should be included with the rest of the town.

At the full Council Meeting on Wednesday, the decision to review the submission of the core strategy was debated; to withdraw the current plan and review the level of house building in relation to the surrounding infrastructure was, in my opinion, what the majority of people of Bedlington had been requesting over the past few years.  As a result of this, I decided to vote with the current administration on this matter.  Pitfalls were pointed out but the Leader of the Council assured us that this decision had not been taken lightly and had been taken with appropriate legal advice.

Although not given a chance to speak on the subject of Sleekburn during the business of the Council owing to time restraints, Russ and I had met with the Business Chair prior to the meeting who assured us that, whilst he would not change it now, a review would be carried out in 6 months time.  I don’t intend to stop fighting for this change as it appears that the residents of that ward have been forgotten and ignored and they feel that they belong with the rest of Bedlington.

The next day, Thursday, together with other County Councillors, Town & Parish Councillors and representatives of the local community, I met with Superintendent Huddleston at Bedlington Police Station to discuss the recent crime and anti-social behaviour in the town.  Also discussed was the closure of the Police Station after 8pm together with the withdrawal of CSO cover after 10pm.  In fairness, there was nothing he could do about the two latter issues but he did assure us that he would fund some extra patrols in the town at weekends after 10pm for a short period of time.

That’s a brief outline of the last two weeks and I could go on and on about what was debated/discussed.  If anyone has any specific points they would like to raise then please contact me and i will do my best to answer them.