Achieving common goal for the club
Following recent correspondence regarding Bath City’s development proposals I write as a ‘community’ shareholder with a modest investment. I responded to ‘The Big Bath City Bid,’ as an outsider(ie no previous club affiliation), with no agenda other than a desire to support the rescue of what I saw as a great community asset. I recognise, of course, that saving the club must not be to the detriment of the greater Twerton community and have every sympathy for those residents who feel that the impact on their neighbourhood is greater than the benefits to the club. Rather than attempt to address all of the complex factors surrounding the club’s development proposals, I would like to offer a few words of purely personal support of the club’s objectives. What has encouraged me most, in the meetings of the supporters’ society (community share-holders) I have attended, is the club’s genuine desire to engage with the community and to ensure that residents are both considered and provided for. I have been impressed at how often the needs of the community are raised and at the attempts to engage in consultation. Clearly, from the concerns expressed in your pages recently, the club has a way to go in convincing residents’ of that good intention but I do not doubt its desire to engage with and develop a mutually-beneficial outcome. The club, has an almost impossible task - to find revenue-earning streams which provide benefit to all, with no downside for the community. All of the recently expressed concerns - not enough social housing, height of the proposed student accommodation, impact on High Street tenants - are worthy of consideration and discussion but I do believe that the club’s intentions are honourable. Doing nothing is not an option. Continued, open dialogue is ! John Moore Combe Down