Have your say about Bexhill

Would you want more activities for youngsters to enjoy or would you like the elderly to feel safer when they go out?

Should the verges in your street be cut more often, or fast-moving traffic be made to slow down?

Your ideas on how to improve where you live and work are crucial to an new local action plan identifying needs and aims in our area.

Rother Voluntary Action is asking everyone to get involved with local action planning and put their thoughts, however modest, forward for discussion.

RVA's Ian Coleman said: "The Local Action Plans are about assisting the community to undergo consultation to identify what their priorties are. The idea is that communities can help serve themselves without thinking it's all down to Rother District Council or the police to sort things out.

"It's about - What can we as people who live and work and play together in the same neighbourhood do for ourselves?

"So now we are seeking views across all the different areas of business, service, recreation and leisure, roads and transport, communication, housing and the environment, wellbeing and helath.

"It is all encompassing - it is really very holistic, and about individual need."

As an example of what RVA has helped achieve in the past, Ian spoke about a long running campaign by locals concerned about speeding traffic in this rural area.

"They had campaigned for 15 years to get speed restriction signs put up, and not got anywhere. This was then their number one issue in their Local Action Plan, and within six months they had got them.

"Then in Sidley, the over-riding number one priority was people felt they didn't have a voice - so we created the Sidley Voice for them which is a local forum which meets every two months. This is a good focal point for finding out what the issues are, and for bringing people together and getting information across about what is going on."

Other Local Action Plans have resulted in playpark funding in Northiam, Crowhurst, and Pebsham, where improved facilities for young people in the recreation ground off Seabourne Road were officially opened before the start of the summer holiday.

Ian commented: "We have seen in Rother a genuine positive response. Once a neighbourhood or area has a Local Action Plan it does generally enable positive change to take place...We can't make any promises, we can't say that if X,Y or Z is identified as a priority that it will happen but we can say those views can be reflected in the Local Action Plan, and what we have seen in the last four years is that this documentation of action plan is recognised by service providers and the community as being a good source of information, and wherever possible they are being postively responded to."

The first step now is the the local consultation process which starts soon with a number of Have Your Say events being held around Bexhill for residents and people working in town to go along and put their views .

- Monday October 19 at Parkhurst Hall (Central Ward) and will be from 9.30-12.30 and 2.30-6pm.

- Saturday October 24, 9.30-1.30pm at St Augustine's Church (Collington)

- Tuesday November 3, 9.30-12.30 and 2-4.30pm at Manor Barn (Old Town)

- Saturday November 7, 9.30-1.30pm at Little Common Community Centre (Kewhurst and St Marks)

- Saturday November 21, 9.30-12.30 at St Stephens church Hall (St Stephens)

- Saturday November 28, 9.30-12.30pm and 2-3.30pm at St Barnabas church (Sackville).

Ian said: "Basically in Bexhill what we are looking at doing is finding out people's views on two levels - how they feel about living in their street, their immediate neighbourhood, but also what they feel across the town. There are going to be specific localised issues but there are going to be different issues about areas important to people in Bexhill.

"What we want is to get as many views from as many different sectors of the population as possible.

Consultant Nick Wates is involved in helping set up the actionn plans and sees the RVA contribution as helping provide a framework to help generate future action.

He commented of the Hear Your Say events: "At each one we are going to have information stalls from people who have expertise and knowledge about certain aspects, such as council planners, or the police, or local voluntary groups. People are going to be able to get help with filling in the questionnaire. This is a way of getting people to start thinking about what facilities are here and what are lacking."

Questionnaires will also be circulated throughout Bexhill through local clubs, groups and organisations, so those who are not able to attend a Have Your Say event will still be able to contribute to the Local Action Plan. In addition RVA will hold informal events outside public places such as sports centres or supermarkets so they can talk to people about the consultation process and how to put their ideas across in the questionnaire. There will be contact points also where members of the public can pick up questionnaires for themselves, such as the Citizens Advice Bureau, the Community Help Point, library, and leisure centre.

The consultation process during the next couple of months will be followed by analysis of data and drafting in December and January, then liason with proposed stakeholders and feedback to the community in February and March, with the plans then finalised, printed and distributed.

Anyone is welcome to attend any of the Have Your Say meetings - otherwise contact [email protected], or telephone on 01424 217259 for more details.