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It started out in 1996 as a good idea with good intentions, but it went disastrously wrong, largely through bad management.
Arun District Council thought it would be a good idea to place a few small, edwardian style retail kiosks in the London Road pedestrian area, the rent from which would pay for a town manager. They delegated the job to a sort of council/business quango specially set up for the purpose, and the quango employed a manager who was basically incompetent.
When the kiosks arrived they were neither edwardian, nor small. Painted in garish colours they were each about the size and shape of a lock-up garage, obscuring existing shop windows and blocking the precinct. There was uproar from shopkeepers and public, and the manager did a bunk. Umpteen furious public meetings later Arun eventually agreed to remove them, but the legacy can still be seen in damage to the London Road paving. Back
HOW MUCH ARE YOUR ARUN DISTRICT COUNCILLORS COSTING YOU?
Councillors’ allowances are pay, not expenses. In addition to this pay they also receive an IT allowance (for their computers!), a mileage allowance, a travel and subsistence allowance, and some of them also receive a ‘special responsibility’ allowance. A few of them don’t take all their allowance or expenses, but most of them do.
Up to 31st March 2011 the total of all this was £421,580.86, with certain husband/wife Councillors handsomely supplementing their household income with their combined incomes from this source. Most notable of these were Council Leader Gillian Brown (£21,935.17) and her husband Robin (£14,356.68), totalling £36,291.85 to keep the home fires burning.
This is not the whole story though. Arun District Council’s Budget Book for 2011/12 shows the total budgeted figure for Councillors and all their associated support costs to be £766,000.
So this is what your Councillors are costing you, every year. The big question is : is this good value for money, bearing in mind that not so long ago Councillors were pleased to do this without charge, happy to be privileged to serve their community? Back Home
THE ASDA THAT ARUN REFUSED US IS NOW TO BE BUILT AT FERRING
A huge regeneration and job-creation opportunity for Bognor Regis was lost when Arun District Council refused planning permission for ASDA at Oldlands Farm in 2008. It has now been announced that an ASDA supermarket will be built at the ‘Country Fayre’ site on the A259, near Ferring and still in the Arun District. Bognor Regis people consider that this opportunity has been ‘stolen’ from them by Councillors from east of the river Arun and are furious that their town has apparently not been fairly treated by the Council.
The background is that in 2008 ASDA applied to Arun District Council for planning permission to build a large store on the Oldlands Farm site, which is just north-east of the ‘Halfords’ roundabout. They also offered to provide the infrastructure for a light industrial area there, which would have provided jobs, and also committed to building a 10,000 sq.ft.office building, providing further jobs.
They did not want the LEC site because they believed the de-contamination work necessary there would be enormously expensive and this made it uneconomic for them.
Their application was widely supported by Bognor Regis people and all the major representative organisations including the Town Council, Civic Society and the Chamber of Commerce. It was felt that the ‘draw’ of ASDA would bring thousands of people to the Bognor Regis area and would be highly beneficial for regeneration.
It was clear, however, that Arun was not favourably disposed towards this, and in due course they refused the application, ignoring completely the clamour from Bognor Regis to approve it.
It is worth noting that of the Councillors on the Development Control Committee that voted to refuse it the vast majority were from east of the river Arun and had no connection with Bognor Regis - except for one, which was Councillor Jackie Maconachie of Bognor Regis. Back Home
MASSIVE SECRET BUILDING PLANS AFOOT IN BOGNOR REGIS?
A leading Councillor has admitted that there may be secret plans to massively build on the Hothamton area at the top of Queensway by St. Modwen, but it seems that this will have none of the benefits previously suggested - just a shop and lots of flats.
This emerged in committee discussions on the Free Parking issue, when a certain leading lady Councillor claimed that free parking could not be offered on the Hothamton car park because it could shortly be redeveloped, providing St. Modwen were able to come up with suitable plans.
A spokesman from St. Modwen would not be drawn on the truth of this, but admitted that if it happened the likely development would be nothing like their previous proposals. Gone would be any chance of getting rid of the ghastly Health Centre building, also gone is any chance of a significant office employer in the heart of the Town - because WSCC have pulled out as an anchor tenant for the quality office building that was planned.
So - an eyesore retained and no jobs to bring wealth to the heart of the Town - what will we get then? A shop, apparently, if they can find someone to take it on. Maybe even more than one, depending on the enthusiasm of retailers. Maybe Morrisons might want it, or maybe they won’t - but if they do, what happens to their existing one? No answers to all that. Oh and, er, yes, flats. How many? Er, probably quite a lot because the development has to be funded you see...
And will this funding provide cross-subsidy for the Regis Centre site so that we can have the leisure uses we want? Oh no, each site has to be treated separately, we’re really only considering Hothamton at the moment.
And what THAT means, folks, is that if we want anything on the Regis Centre site it’ll have to be squeezed in under and alongside ANOTHER lot of flats. There’s going to be trouble..... Back Home