My 
successful efforts to improve lighting on Lancaster Close and Cintra Park seem to have found there way into an RBC press release. This must mean the projects are about to become a reality!
As an opposition councillor it is not usually the Council's policy or practise to promote my activities. Oh well, all publicity is good publicity if more people get to hear about it!
I am Safer Communities spokesperson for the Lib Dem Group on RBC. I sit on the East and South Reading Safer Reading Forums and the Safer Reading Campaign which looks at crime issues across town.
The Safer Reading budget is useful - it is one of the few mechanisms that allows residents and ward councillors to get funding for small-scale crime-reduction projects.
I have been quite successful in getting over the years. In 2006 I focussed on getting alley gates fitted on properties affected by flytipping and burglaries in and around Addington Road. These alleyways are common between terraces in Reading. Ownership can be hard to establish, and I remember it took some time to get 'agreement' from all parties to install a gate. There are still a few alleyways that need gating, but we know where they are!
Last year I put in a bid for Safer Reading funding to improve lighting on the footpath linking Newcastle Road with Cintra Park sometime ago after local residents complained of feeling unsafe. Additional lighting will be installed in the Park and on the footpath.
Residents on Lancaster Close have suffered a large number of burglaries, as well as regular attacks of flytipping and graffiti along the alley way which links Christchurch Road with Lancaster Close. A new lighting column has been approved by the alley way.
It took a while for funding to come on stream, but it looks like these works are now about to start - good news all round!
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