All change in the town centre
Community safety is extremely important to us and that’s why
I’m delighted to see the progress being made through the Your Home, Your Street, Our Community Programme.
Led by Police Scotland and bringing a whole host of community partners, it works with local residents to tackle the issues that matter most to them.
The programme is delivering real benefits in Paisley town centre right now through six weeks of action addressing perceived problems including antisocial behaviour, drug offences and night-time safety.
The detailed action plan includes additional police and warden patrols, mobile CCTV, taxi marshalling at weekends as well as opportunities for young people to showcase the different activities available locally.
This builds on successful interventions in Erskine, Ferguslie, Gallowhill and Shortroods.
In fact, following the work in Shortroods, there was a 30 per cent increase in the number of people reporting how safe they feel in their neighbourhoods.
We want Renfrewshire to be a place everyone is proud to call home and I’d like to extend my thanks to everyone involved for their sterling efforts so far.
Road safety is also a priority for the council and, combined with record-level investment by our SNP administration in our roads and footpaths, we have now just launched the Ready for Winter campaign as colder conditions are now upon us.
Renfrewshire has nine gritting machines on 24/7 standby and they’ve already started their work which will see them cover more than 800km of Renfrewshire roads throughout the winter period.
Neatly named after famous faces and places, including Ploughlo Grittini, Tony Gritzpatrick and not forgetting Paisleigh, you can track their whereabouts via the council website and locate your nearest grit bin, with 540 stocked and ready for residents to use.
There’s also lots of helpful information at www.renfrewshire.gov.uk/ readyforwinter on what you can do to prepare yourself, your home and your business.
It’s all part of our #RenReady campaign which you can follow across our social media channels.
Our winter events programme is in full swing and it’s been fantastic to see so many people out enjoying the activities, performing and not forgetting spending their money with our local businesses.
The Spree festival is a firm fixture in my calendar and the eighth edition proved the best yet as more than 12,000 festival goers saw it achieve record breaking attendance levels.
The mix of music, comedy and children’s entertainment from the stunning spiegeltent in Paisley’s County Square was brilliant and it was great to host renowned UK and international performers here in Renfrewshire.
And the entertainment extended across Renfrewshire through the Spree for All fringe programme, with 2,500 people attending events in Lochwinnoch, Johnstone, Kilbarchan, Paisley and Renfrew.
At the weekend, Paisley was hauntingly beautiful as the town centre was transformed into a spooky outdoor circus, with many thousands of revellers enjoying the hugely popular Halloween Festival.
And this Saturday sees fireworks light up the Paisley sky at 7pm in the town centre.
Wrap up warm and see you there.