Four Bracknell communities are being celebrated after taking charge of their futures as part of Bracknell Forest Borough Council’s Thriving Communities programme.
Council leader Mary Temperton praised town-centre residents, Priestwood-and-Garth, Wildridings-and-Easthampstead and Great Hollands for “taking a voice for themselves”.
Wildridings and Easthampstead have a newly refurbished community centre, Priestwood and Garth run a thriving community centre and an active foodbank, and Great Hollands has seen a warm-space at the Community Centre evolve into a community club run by ward councillors Janet Cochrane and Cath Thompson. The Bracknell News visited the warm space last week, where about 20 people were keeping warm and playing bingo.
In the town centre, four communities — Mount Pleasant, Jubilee Court, Orchard Court and Amber House — are already acting. Mount Pleasant, a mixed estate of 187 homes north of the railway, held a residents’ meeting on Wednesday 28 January at the K2 building at the Kerith Centre to demand better services.
Attendees included around 20 residents, four Southern Housing staff, four Police Community Support Officers and two borough councillors, including the council leader. Residents raised antisocial behaviour, structural worries about the building, windows, damp and mould, and fuel costs.
In the run-up to the meeting Southern Housing ran a “Day of Massive Action”, knocking on all 187 doors to check windows, intercoms and other issues. They discovered seven new cases of damp and mould they want to tackle.
Tenants also complained about shared facilities not working. One woman in her twenties who lives in a one-bedroom flat said: "The washing machines smell so disgusting that they make me feel quite ill." Her husband said: "Because they’re so disgusting we bought our own washing machine, but we still have to pay for the communal one in the service charge."
There was confusion over which refuse goes in which bin and complaints that recycling crews will not take containers contaminated with dog-poo bags or wrongly sorted waste. Residents asked the council leader for bins to be labelled with pictograms showing what can be recycled.
A Southern Housing spokesperson said: "We’re continuing to work closely with our residents living at Mount Pleasant to deliver improvements to their building and ensure everyone is living in a home where they feel comfortable and warm. "We visited 187 homes last Thursday, January 22, where we fixed a number of minor repair issues. We will be revisiting to resolve other concerns which were raised on the day. "We have picked up some additional repair issues following the resident meeting last night – Thursday, January 29. "We will be reaching out to those individual residents to investigate further and encourage residents to contact us if there’s anything else we can do to support."
Mary Temperton said: "They’re working together as a community. "They’ve taken a voice for themselves which is a big community response. It’s a huge achievement."
Ted O'Neill, Local Democracy Reporter
