Dear Editor,
 
At last week’s Frome Town Council External Affairs Committee I was pleased to see councillors draw on local residents’ talents in drawing up a new strategy for improving Frome’s open spaces. I was able to report that Mendip District Council is also now drawing up its own Play Strategy, and I hope to help the two councils work together and with local residents to improve open spaces through targeted investment, joined up thinking and local community action.

There will also be a new working party on sports and leisure in the town, and this will also need to involve Mendip on their emerging strategies for sports pitches and the future of our leisure centres. A good level of cooperation between councils, sports clubs and community groups is what we need to make the most of the available resources, for example when money becomes available from new developments (e.g. the new surgery at the Showfield), and to avoid unnecessary duplication of efforts.   

After the headline last week, I have to say there certainly is data on flytipping, collected by Mendip’s contractors, which shows that flytipping generally went up sharply for several months after new charges were introduced and opening hours reduced at recycling centres. The district council has had to spend more on clearing this up, and is at last starting to get to grips with a new strategy to reduce it. The town council is hoping to address this also, but the ruling Conservatives at county certainly appeared to consider that a rise in flytipping was an acceptable cost to our local communities. 
   
Adam Boyden
Lib Dem Mendip District Councillor, Frome College ward
Shadow Spokesperson for Governance, Assets and Public Spaces