Watlington Speaks
Click here for the latest Watlington Speaks Progress Report
PROGRESS OF ‘WATLINGTON SPEAKS’
‘Watlington Speaks’ was the name chosen for the Community Consultation launched in April 2008, to work towards a Parish Plan for Watlington.
To ensure that the views of all members of the community were fully represented, the Parish Council set up a Steering Committee to produce a questionnaire sent to every household in Watlington and Christmas Common.
Please click here to see the questionnaire responses.
Please click here to see the written answers and data 
The Committee, with the help of the WPC, first held several events providing opportunities for residents to make their views and vision known, to ensure that they were not led into specific areas of thinking and to find out what issues were important to those living in and near Watlington and what their vision was for the future.
Residents were invited to use post-it notes to stick their ‘love it – hate it’ comments on boards!
- at the Annual Parish Meeting, residents were offered a glass of wine and were also invited to put coloured dots on a map of Watlington to indicate where they lived. This gave an idea of the spread of input across the town, without identifying individuals.
- in the High Street on a busy, sunny Saturday morning, which sparked a lot of interest.
- another consultation planned for Watlington Festival on the late May Bank Holiday was unfortunately 'rain stop play'!
- at the Youth Music Festival in the Paddock in July
- at a fund raising event for the Recreation Ground renovation project
Young people were invited to express their views -
- they were invited to respond to questions about what they did or did not like about Watlington, which was recorded on camcorder and then transcribed into a word document.
- they were also given an opportunity to write on ‘graffiti’ boards some of the things they would like to see in Watlington, which were collated onto a spread sheet.
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March 2009 to May 2009 |
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The Steering Committee collected the information from all the consultations and collated this into a format to use as the base for a questionnaire that would reflect the views and aspirations expressed in the consultations. It was decided that the questionnaire should be for those aged 16 and over and that the concerns of younger members of the community would be dealt with later in a separate study.
Help was sought from ORCC, SODC and OCC, with whom meetings were held, and questionnaires used by other communities were used in producing one suitable for Watlington. This process took until the end of May 2009. |
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June 2009 |
| 1,100 questionnaires were delivered to every household in Watlington and those in Christmas Common that lie within the Parish of Watlington. |
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July 2009 |
| A call to each house was made to collect the questionnaires or ask the householder to return them to the Post Office or the Parish Office. By the end of July 40% of questionnaires had been returned. |
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August 2009 |
| Questionnaires were delivered to SODC for scanning. |
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September 2009 |
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Data from the returned questionnaires was posted on the Parish Council website.
The written answers and final comments were then collated manually by the steering committee to produce a word document. This was very time consuming and only finally completed by end of April 2010.
All the data obtained has already led to some issues being addressed:
| Traffic, Transport and Parking |
Traffic volume, size, speed and pollution was a major concern, together with parking.
Initiatives by the WPC and OCC are underway to address some of the problems raised, including OCC consultation on parking and speeding.
WPC has created dedicated shoppers’ parking spaces in Hill Road car park. |
| Information |
Those who asked to receive local news by e-mail are now doing so. Others wishing to enroll can send their contact details to wpc@watlington-oxon-pc.gov.uk
The large number of people who volunteered to help with existing events or launch new initiatives or events were contacted, as a result of which some groups and projects are already underway: |
| Church Hall |
The future of the Church Hall was a major issue of concern. The data, written answers and final comments were sent to the church authority and also to those who were opposed to their plans for the hall. As a result the Church Hall Concern group was formed to look at ways of retaining the hall for the community churchhallconcern@live.co.uk |
| Christmas Fair |
A number of volunteers came forward and helped make an enlarged 2009 event a great success. |
| Watlington in Bloom |
A committee was formed and work commenced with bulb planting and clearing of overgrown areas. A fund-raising ‘Gardeners’ Questions’ event was organised and held in Town Hall. |
| Charity Shop |
A committee was formed to research viability. There was interest from a charity, but no suitable premises have been found to date. |
| Neighbourhood Watch |
All those who expressed an interest in joining or helping with a local scheme were told how to contact the local police organiser and co-ordinator. |
| Volunteer Drivers for Hospital visits |
An inaugural meeting is scheduled for May 2011 |
| Watlington Blog |
A volunteer is setting up a blog, with the help of others interested |
| Environmental Group |
Some volunteers have joined the existing Environmental Group, but others might be more interested in addressing problems of sustainability and this will be looked into. |
| May Festival |
Considerable interest was shown in re-starting this event, but to date insufficient numbers have come forward as helpers. It has been decided by the organisers to take a break and maybe look at the possibilities again in 2012. |
Meanwhile, interest shown in the following have yet to find volunteers to organise or set them up:
- Swimming Group
- Arts & Poetry Events & Exhibitions
- Film Club, Theatre Group or Cinema Group or Club
- Swap Shop
- Skills Bank
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