Happy Christmas to all residents, and a Happy New Year !!
We hope to enter 2008 fired up with will and enthusiasm to
Keep our library lively and to
improve our Bus service so that we can restore something of the flexibility we had a couple of years ago.
At last the pavement is repaired ! Your Councillors have fought long and hard to improve the pavement along the north side of Wimborne Road, now it is just wonderful and no more danger of pushchairs and wheelchairs sliding into the road.
The 30mph speed limit is very soon to be extended to just past the Lamb’s Green Pub so we hope that Wimborne Road will be a safer and more pleasant road to walk along.
It has been rumoured that the library service wants to introduce selfservice kiosks into our smaller libraries at a cost of at least £1.7m. They say this will be needed if volunteers come into the libraries to help the librarians.
Library supporters feel this is a lot of money to spend and wonder if this is the right time or even the right direction to be going in. We are asking a lot of questions about the RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) system that has been earmarked.
The Tories on East Dorset District Council have voted to stop the supply of black sacks to all residents!
As a result of a cost cutting exercise there will be no more supplies of black sacks, harvest the ones you have carefully, once they are finished you will need to buy supplies from the supermarket. This really does seem mean, it will apparently save £93,000 a year.
All your Liberal democrat Councillors argued very strongly against this move but the Tories won the day.
Public pressure and hard work by your LibDem Councillors has persuaded the Tory administration not to close any libraries, however fairly massive cuts in the service are planned.
The Book fund will be cut, most of the burden being on Adult Fiction where the budget is to be halved. Expenditure on Newspapers and magasines will also be halved. Hours are to be reduced, in Corfe Mullen from 30 hours per week to 20 hours. This means that the Library will only be open on three weekdays, Monday, Wednesday and Friday and for just 2 and a half hours on a Saturday morning.
Your comments are welcomed and a survey is being sent out to all households very soon, please reply to it giving your views to the Library Service in Dorchester.
