Town Park fits the fiscal stimulus bill, says Deputy
Thursday 27th August 2009, 2:56PM BST.
Deputy Geoff Southern.
A TOWN Deputy has come up with a plan to finally make the Millennium Town Park a reality – and help kick-start the economy in the process.
Deputy Geoff Southern has proposed transferring an extra £10 million of States reserves into the fiscal stimulus pot and using it to fund the park at Gas Place.
He has lodged a proposition for debate by the States saying that the park is a perfect target for economic stimulus cash.
Last year, the States voted to allocate more than £7 million towards the park, but it was removed in this year’s States Business Plan, which sets out future spending.
‘I think that there is still demand for a park,’ Deputy Southern said. ‘That site is blighted. Nothing has happened to it for ten years.
• See Thursday’s JEP for full story.
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At least we’ll have somewhere to sit when we are all out of work……..
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And the Fort Regent car park and access please then we have 2 parks in Town and it will be a more beautiful place for all of us.
This is fiscal stimulus too !!
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“…that corner of town will be regenerated and you will get lots of people trying to move back into the area and wanting to move their businesses there.”
Hmm, I’d say that area (Belmont, Stopford, St Marks Rds. etc) was about as densely populated as any place in Jersey, yet the Deputy expects people to want to move there once the park is built??
He also expects businesses to want to move into the area? Where? Does the Dep. Not know that there is precious little space in that area for businesses to move to, and the idea that Planning would see their way to making the process of change of use or development in the area anywhere near easy is laughable! How overdue is the ‘North of St Helier Master Plan’ Min. Cohen?
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Good Idea Deputy Southern.
I recently read that in Manchester lots of parks and gardens are having fruit trees planted in them, their reasoning being that a lot of people now don’t know the slightest about making food, only making money and driving to Sainsburys.
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Deputy Southern is quite correct in saying something needs to be done to bring this Park into being and revive a whole area of the town environmentally, particularly as it has already become more densely populated and lacks recreational green space!
He is also correct in saying that the construction of the Park will revive the area and in the short to medium term create construction and ongoing maintenance and up- keep jobs.
The longterm, attracting new business etc. to the area will depend on how the finished article is run and maintained? If it follows the Howard Davies Park Route (On a more open basis perhaps) it will be successful.
Ongoing upkeep and organised schemes within the Park area such as a section encouraging area resident allotments for example would enhance the public involvement in sustaining standards.
If it just evolves as a grassy open space with a few trees, then all that will happen is that it will become a magnet for vandalism and mischief, and a dilapidated “No Go” area!
More power to your elbow Deputy Southern, with regard to this proposal!
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What a shame Red Geoff doesn’t put as much effort into generating funds as he puts into spending them.
Perhaps he would like to contribute the money people gave him towards his deserved fine for breaking the law he was part of enacting.
This man is a joke and if he had a scrap of decency would resign
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Nick#5
“…He is also correct in saying that the construction of the Park will… …create… …ongoing maintenance and up- keep jobs…”
Not sure that’s actually a good idea, considering that a States Park Keeper is on something like £25kpa as are the Gardners, all out of the tax-payer’s pocket.
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7 J.Lamborrari: Yes, but the money being suggested for use here has already been set aside in reserve for precisely this sort of purpose in times of economic slowdown.
Perhaps copying the former Bailiff’s suggestion with regard to extra funding for Jersey Heritage,i.e. instead of spending all the money directly on construction costs use some of it as a capital sum to generate an ongoing income to fund the upkeep and maintenance of the ongoing scheme?
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PJG, your comments are quite offensive, I do not believe that Mr Southern is a communist, nor should it matter if he were.
He is advocating the long supported and much needed park on the east side of town. It is about time that the States whom have supported it either s*&t or get off the pot.
Personally I would rather turn the Odeon site into a multi-story car park than Ann Court.
The park will not bring business to the area, but it will improve the ecology and might just make people happy.
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@ Nick #8
The idea of taking a lump sum from reserves to sit and provide income for future expenses doesn’t make any sense for a park.
What happens if there’s expense that isn’t foreseen? the taxpayer would have to pick up the bill anyway. What if there’s a surplus? Would it be returned to the tax-payer? I personally doubt it, but if it were how is this different to just accepting the expense and budgeting for it? Where is the logic in ring-fencing a lump sum today?
Parks are costly, which is why most parks are not created using public money.
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I don’t quite follow Deputy Sotherns logic by saying ‘Nothing has happened to it for years’
Correct me if I am wrong, but the return on X number of parking spaces at 58p an hour, with virtually no capital outlay sounds pretty good to me !
A park will cost money to build, money to run and repair, get used and abused at night, and provide zero return on the investment !
If people really want to see this and other facilities, work out the cost, and then make the appropriate increase to GST, then ask again – Do you realy want this ?
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