‘You’ve made us feel like we wasted our time’

An Open Letter to the Senior Management Team, Stirling Council, from Sara MacMillan on behalf on the Mercat Cross & City Centre Community Council.

In January this year we were approached and asked to take part in consultation as part of the planning for an application for funding for The City Development Framework.

At the start of the consultation you assured us that our input was crucial to the success of the application for Scottish Government Funding for the regeneration of Mercat Cross and City Centre.

Along with this you explained that Stirling Council was employing a new method in dealing with communities. You assured us you would listen.

So we invested amongst us hundreds of hours, guided by the communities team, and the vast majority of us completed a new Scottish Government document, Place Standard.

We gave honest feedback on the conditions under which we live.

We ranked the importance to us of the impact of crime, transport accessibility, access to public services and facilities, some of us spoke of housing problems others of problems with absentee landlords.

We told you about how little control we feel we have over the conditions some of us are forced to live in.

We organised, and attended, three community consultation days, we invited people within our community to come talk to us, we gathered more views, we shared our optimism that we were doing something that would improve the lives of the people in our community.

We did this because for the first time in a very long time there was a real hope that Stirling Council were actively looking to address the social problems that exist within Mercat Cross and City Centre.

We gave all this information to you on the understanding that the ideal ‘live, work, play’ would be applied to any development/ improvement.

First of all the impact on the people who live here must be considered, then those who work here and finally those here for recreation.

Assurances were made by you as we drew our information gathering to a close that you would continue to consult with us.

No funding application would be made without us having a chance to review. We would be shown plans and be allowed to comment.

We continued to feel optimistic. A sense of pride in what we had achieved pervaded us.

Community engagement and consultation is hard work, we worked hard and we felt we did well.

It was with a sense of utter disappointment that we discovered that at a meeting of the Special Finance and Economy Committee on Tuesday, April 26, a request for £300,000 will be made for three projects without any consultation with us.

This report offers proposals for viable spend within 2016/17 on projects that reflect the priorities agreed at council in December 2015 with the aim of acting as important catalysts for securing larger externally sourced investment.

As we understand it these are proposals for spending on projects that will demonstrate your commitment to the key areas of the City Development Framework.

You are looking for £200 million of Scottish Government funding and you did explain to us at the beginning that the funding for the regeneration of Mercat Cross & City Centre was dependant on community consultation.

Money spent on our community is welcome but we are at a loss at to the thought process and the reasoning behind two of the three projects.

We told you about children on Cowane Street who have no access to outdoor play.

We told you about prostitutes operating in our streets.

We told you about drug paraphernalia in the only park within our community.

We told you about older people trapped at the top of a hill after bus services have been withdrawn, families forced to live in substandard accommodation because of a lack of housing and antisocial behaviour affecting people on a daily basis.

After all that you said, we expected you to help.

To throw at you your own words: “...it is important to recognise that the ambition for economic growth is not an end in itself but is matched with a commitment to equalities and social justice that will support employability and skills development, community empowerment, regeneration and tackling disadvantage.”

Why then did you decide that a kitchen for a cafe in The Tolbooth and an outdoor market were a good starting point for the regeneration of the Mercat Cross and City Centre?

Why after promising us ongoing consultation did you not think to phone one of our office bearers or write a quick email telling us of your plan? It’s becoming clear that you have no interest in dealing with our problems. ‘Live, work, play’ −was it just a hook to catch some fools? Now you can tick a box and say the consultation was done.

You have pretty quickly diminished our enthusiasm. Disengaged some of us.

You’ve made us feel like we wasted our time and we’re back at the beginning talking about how little control we have over the conditions some of us are forced to live in.

But, hey ho, at least we’ll have a cafe to sit in and moan about it.