The Thanet Star

• Topics:
•   Blogging
•   Business
•   Elsewhere
•   Politics
•   Roads and Signs
•   Stars of Thanet
•   Thanet
•   TV and Media
•   Your Letters

• About
• Subscribe
• Site Policies

Thanet Star - actively improving Thanet one idea at a time

Fix Our Town Centre Parking

The price of town centre parking is at odds with the hope of town centre regeneration. If people are to be encouraged to use our existing town centres it must be profitable for them to do so.

Rightly or wrongly our current Prime Minister and his Chancellor have introduced extensive tax cuts aimed at improving commercial activity and reducing the burden on average folks like you and I. Our own council however has failed to follow this leadership and appears to have placed party political ideologies ahead of practical necessity.

This is where you come in.

By sending letters and emails to the relevant persons we can hope to push for a change.

If one person sends an email that's a radical. If three send an email they are a minority but if many send an email that's a movement.

If we have to nag our way to better town centre parking then so be it. All you have to do is enter your name and email address into the form and it will send a Freedom of Information Request demanding more information about the tax cuts being passed on to town centres.

If enough of us start telling the council what we think then it is in the best interest, (politically), of our councillors to support or at the very least respect our opinion.

Send That Nagging Email Right Now

It is very important that you give your real name and a real address where councillors and council workers can contact you. Not doing so devalues the effort being made and assures public servants that they can ignore us. Giving your name to the request makes it serious and adds punch.

Your email (from your email address) will be sent to a selection of Councillors and two important departments (for getting some answers). One of which is the one we are hoping to push some action from. Car Parking can be called on 01843 577470 and Customer Services can be got hold of on 01843 577168.

I do not know how true it is but councillors have a reputation of not paying much attention to emails and many are famed (for some reason) for not knowing how to use email. Rather than not get your message through to at least one councillor I have "randomly" selected three of each flavour.

They are:

• Roger Latchford (Conservative)
• Sandy Ezekiel (Conservative)
• Mike Taylor (Conservative, Standards committee)
• Iris Johnston (Labour, Joint Transportation Board)
• Harry Scobie (Labour, Overview Scrutiny Panel)
• John Watkins (Labour, Margate)

You can treble the effectiveness of your action by collecting the email addresses here and sending a follow up set of questions in the way you normally send emails.

If you want to be kept up to date on issues surrounding Thanet then you may wish to sign up to One of these fine newsletters