Friday 11 May 2012

My comments to Town Council re: Sort It on 24.04.12



Councillors, as the Chairman of the Sort It Development Trust I need to declare a prejudicial interest and leave whilst you are debating and voting upon this application for a donation. I am however allowed to make some comments regarding this beforehand.

I would very much urge the council to consider making the donation towards Sort It and to not delay the decision unnecessarily as is currently being proposed. The application asks for £250 to support the creation of a website that would promote local businesses and market traders – this is quite clearly something that the council should be supporting and would be of major benefit to our town and its people. For Sort It to be able to show that they have the backing of their Town Council will greatly assist in obtaining funding from other sources. That simple £250 from this council could be the springboard to much greater pots money.

I believe when this was discussed at the committee there were concerns that a financial projection and a constitution had not been provided but I believe these have now been submitted, so I can see no reason why we could not make a decision to award the money at our meeting this evening, and embrace the momentum that there clearly is with this initiative. Thank-you.



Councillors, this is another debate that I cannot take part in but I just want to outline what this discussion is about as it has become somewhat confusing. Sort It wants to focus on a number projects over the next few months and initially, one of those projects is a night market or food fayre as it is more likely to be. A team from Sort It has been working on this project and they have the support of the current market superintendent who brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to the team which is to be commended. The plan would be to run the fayre on a Tuesday evening, primarily focusing on food stall retailers rather than traditional market stalls. At this stage, the idea is little more than that – an idea. The team first need to secure the support of the council before developing the proposal any further I am hopeful that the council can give its backing this evening and task officers to work with the team so that the concept can be taken forward to the next stage.

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