The Crofton Park Local Assembly

Patrick1971 not only attended, but went to a lot of effort to write an account of the evening, dedication like that deserves its own thread:

The Crofton Park Assembly was on last night; were there any other BCers there?

There was a pretty good turnout, over 100 people I would have thought.

The format was that everyone was on a table of about eight people. You had to say two things you liked about the area and two things you didn't, then, from the resulting lists, select the main issue that you didn't like and discuss how it could be improved. Then each table presented its issue and solutions.

The two main issues in Crofton Park appear to be lack of stuff for kids to do (which I personally am fairly sceptical about, but there you go), and dog mess! One of the councillors there, Jackie Addison, is apparently spearheading an anti-dog poo initiative, and promised to let us know "how far in it" she was...

There was a paid facilitator for the evening, which I think worked really well; he kept things moving along and got attention back when the crowd started chattering. There was a good mix of people although not enough younger ones; at the age of 36 I was one of the youngest there. Not sure if the Crofton Park ward is demographically older or not.

It'll be interesting to see how these assemblies progress and how much actually gets done. What was quite striking was how much people didn't know; one chap on my table said he'd never seen any plans for Honor Oak Park station, when they're freely available online. Another woman claimed there was no disabled access to Crofton Park station, when there is. Someone else wanted free bags handed out to dog owners to clear up mess, and apparently Lewisham Council already offers this service. And so on.

The next one's on 13th October. We got a free shopping bag this time, so there's a free gift incentive to attend! Would be interesting to hear if anyone else was there and what they thought.