Liberal Councillor sets up a new initiative
Liberal Councillor Jenny Roach of Silverton in Devon was concerned that many people in the Village looked to the local Councils to ‘sort out’ problems in the village when many of the issues could be addressed at a local level. Jenny put together a project which she named ‘We Live Here’ and sought the support of the Parish Council to facilitate and underwrite it financially. The Parish Council supported Jenny’s idea and a sub-committeee was formed to take the project to the next stage.
The Project seeks to involve Parishioners in building a better community and already several people have joined the sub committee. The first activity was a litter pick which was well supported by villagers. the District Council provided the insurance and all the equipment needed so that the WLH committee had to sort out all the local organisational bits and bobs such as routes, health and safety etc! The local Scout Group provided a lunch for the returning litter pickers and all who took part agreed that they had enjoyed the morning and that it had been a great success.
The committee is now working on a second project which is to provide a Welcome Pack for anyone who moves in to the village. As part of this a competition has been set up to design a logo for the project, unlike larger organisations our logo will only cost £30, that's the cost of three gift tokens for the winners in each age category!
It may well be in order to stimulate a sense of community and encourage voluntary work that we need to look at different ways of enabling people to take part and be involved. Projects such as this mean that people can put aside a few hours whenever they wish but that theyare not committted to raising funds or attending meetings.