Brockley's £10,000 question

Tuesday, 27th November, 8pm
George Lewis Room
St John’s Church
Lewisham Way
London
SE8 4EA

Next Tuesday, Brockley councillors Dean Walton, Darren Johnson and Romayne Phoenix will hold a community meeting to discuss the allocation of the Brockley Locality Fund - £10,000 of public money, which can be allocated to good causes in the Brockley area.

A shortlist has been drawn up from ideas submitted by local residents, some of which had their merits hotly debated here.

Cllr Dean Walton has provided Brockley Central with an advanced look at the list of projects, which is below. We've also created a new poll so that readers unable to attend the meeting can register their views online. We must stress that this is an unofficial poll and while we will pass on the results of the vote to the councillors before the meeting, it is obviously an unscientific sampling of the Brockley population (highly skewed towards towards the bored and office based!). However, the councillors will take the results in to consideration as part of the wider consultation process.

Here's the list in full:

1. Digicams for young people to report graffiti etc to Love Lewisham, with monthly prize and end-of-year exhibition

2. Fixed sports equipment on Tanners Hill Estate for children

3. Youth worker for Tanners Hill one night per week for a year

4. Street trees with metal railing guards

5. Contribution to Brockley Common

6. Clean up and secure garages in Vulcan Terrace

7. Picnic benches where young people can socialise, Pitman House

8. Improvements to Lewisham Way memorial gardens

9. Improvements to Veronica House Gardens

10. Solar panels installed at another local primary school

11. Contribution to Myatt Gardens playground fund

12. Contribution to Brockley Fun Run

13. Contribution to Brockley weekend arts festival

14. Equipment / storage space for planned after-school club for 5-11s

15. Contribution to Healthy Brockley Community Awards


The poll is on the right-hand side of this site. Please register your votes before the closing deadline of 5pm on Tuesday, to make your voice heard.

Our own, personal, criteria for where the money should go would be that it should support a project which wouldn't happen without some public funding, that it should support projects which benefit the widest possible number of people and it should leave some sort of tangible, lasting legacy. On that basis, we'd plump for street trees in planters on Brockley Road over projects like the Fun Run (nice idea) or Healthy Brockley (conflates eating vegetables with 'spiritual health'), which could be delivered without the need for any public money.

And "digicams" for kids? Doesn't every child have a mobile phone before it gets its first tooth these days? And isn't the whole point of the Love Lewisham project is that it's made reporting graffiti and fly tipping really easy and quick for any one (yes, even adults) , without the need to spend council tax money on consumer electronics?

Anyway, to whomever came up with that idea, they will be pleased to know that (despite referring to ourselves in the plural) we only have one vote, same as everyone else.

Happy voting!