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Councillor Roger Truelove. |
A council report has confirmed Swale Borough Council allocated more than £1 million to open space, leisure and environmental improvements in the financial year 2019/20.
The funding came from council reserves and included:
• £523,000 for new and refurbished public toilet facilities across the borough.
• £165,000 for hall improvements in Sheppey and West Faversham, and for Faversham pool.
• £159,000 for parks and play areas.
• £93K for environmental improvements.
In addition to these, further allocations were made to the Mill Skate Park, Dolphin Barge Museum site, and the Artesian Well at Oare.
The detailed allocation of the Special Project Fund is part of a report on the council’s finances in the last financial year which goes to the cabinet on Wednesday, 8th July.
The leader of the council and cabinet member for finance, Roger Truelove, said:
“The first year of the coalition was one of sound financing. Despite considerable pressures on spending, especially from homelessness, the accounts for the year shows a surplus of £64,000 which will go into reserves.
The reserves remain buoyant at over £23 million and we believe that it is only right that we should carefully use a relatively small part of those reserves to make one off improvements in the borough.
We want local people to enjoy their open spaces and so it is unacceptable that Swale has not previously done enough to provide decent public toilet facilities.
We want people to enjoy our parks and we want children to have decent play areas that are stimulating.
We want people to have proper community hall facilities and we want to provide funding for our climate emergency initiatives.
This is just a start and despite many financial challenges, we will continue to make these improvements a priority for our communities.
With the introduction of new area committees some of the future funding will be devolved so that local members can decide the priorities for their areas.”
Swale Borough Council
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