A radical new way of involving communities around Keswick in local government decisions begins on Tuesday, June 5th, with the first ever Keswick Community Board meeting.
Keswick is one of five areas of Cumbria piloting the idea of community boards which are designed to improve on existing local government and other public services such as police and health by being more responsive and accountable to local people and by devolving power, influence and resources to a truly local level.
The very first meeting of Keswick's pilot community board will be held at The Victory Hall at Braithwaite on June 5th at 7.15pm. The meeting is open to everyone.
The community board will be led by the county councillor for Keswick and Derwent Elizabeth Barraclough.
District councillors from the area have been invited along with parish and town councillors from the parishes included in the community board area: St John's-in-the-Vale, Threlkeld, Borrowdale, Above Derwent , Under Skiddaw, Bassenthawite and Keswick. Representatives from several local organisations and partnerships such as the Market Town Initiative and Tourism Association have also been invited.
The first meeting will include agenda items on Keswick area's Market Town Initiative, managing waste in the Keswick area and getting communities, and young people in particular, involved in new board.
Mrs Barraclough said: "This is an exciting opportunity for local people to really get involved in a new way of deciding issues which affect them and their communities.
"We hope to get as many people as possible involved so we can tap into the wealth of local expertise and experience for the benefit of the community. During these early, formative meetings will be finding out what people want and how we can best make our community board work.
"These boards could really be a sea-change in the way people deal with local councils which can all too often seem distant and irrelevant. We have a chance to turn that round with community boards and put more power in the hands of local people."
Community boards are also being piloted in Grange and Cartmel, Barrow, North East Copeland and North Allerdale.
These first experimental boards will help decide exactly how the system will work if it is introduced as part of the switch to single unitary local government for the county.
Cumbria County Council proposed a unitary council for the whole of Cumbria in response to a Government invitation to come up with ways of creating a more efficient system of local government which would make better use of public money.
The county council proposed a system which would see Cumbria County Council and the county's six district councils replaced by a single tier of local government delivering all services from highways to housing and education to leisure. The Government's Department of Communities and Local Government rated Cumbria's bid highly in its initial assessment and in July ministers are expected to make a final decision on whether Cumbria can proceed towards fully-fledged unitary status in summer 2009.
Running the pilot schemes will provide vital information on areas such as: size and resources; the work of councillors; how to engage marginalised and hard-to-reach groups; the relationship between community boards, neighbourhood forums and local committees; how to respond better to community action plans; and partnership working with businesses, voluntary organisations and town and parish councils.
ENDS
Media enquiries to Justin Hawkins, Media Officer on 01228 606334