Wilmslow Town Council invited representatives from Sandbach Partnerships and Sandbach Clean Team to attend their meeting this month and give a brief presentation about their work.
The Town Council has set up a working group to consider an ongoing programme for keeping the town tidy and invited Dot Flint and Dick Macaulay to share her experiences with them.
Sandbach Clean Team was set up in 2005 and now consists of about 165 volunteers. They organise monthly litter picks focussing on particular areas in the town, which a core of volunteers get involved in, whilst others simply keep the front of their own property clean.
The Clean Team provide all the equipment and from the beginning they wanted to involve children from local schools and groups, such as the scouts, who are provided with little litter pickers and high hi-visibility vests.
The team pick up all the rubbish in bags and have an agreement with Cheshire East Council (CEC) that they leave the bags in an area and CEC come and pick them up and take them away.
Dick Macauley advised town councillors "Have an organisation that is reliable, communicate with people and make it fun."
He added "You've got to stick at it. It does work if you get the right formula."
Dot added "Get like-minded people involved at the beginning, starting off small and growing larger and larger.
"It's so community minded and everybody can get involved."
Sandbach Clean Team needs about £700 per year to cover insurance, equipment and administration costs - part of which is covered by Sandbach Town Council.
Wilmslow Town Council will now consider the advice offered during their presentation which Cllr Keith Purdom described as "very inspirational".
Comments
Here's what readers have had to say so far. Why not add your thoughts below.
Your point is valid. However, I believe that groups such as Sandbach Clean Team exist to complement the work of the street cleaners and educators - in much the same way that the St John's Ambulance exists to complement the work of NHS staff. Where budgets are stretched volunteers provide a means of freeing resources for other tasks. They always have. Think of nearly any charity you can and you can probably make an argument for saying that The State has some responsibility for providing that particular service. We all know the money isn't there which is why we instinctively give to charities such as Barnardo's, Shelter and the NSPCC. The very important thing to remember is that these are volunteers. They do what they do because they want to - for whatever reason - and one of the effects is that their lives - and those of the people around them - are better because of the satisfaction they feel as a result of what they do.
Great for sandbach , no problems here.
Litter will always continue, better organised paid systems will work in wilmslow as it's a busy town not a small high street in a village without a high school./offices/bars which expanding
I still think again, that east cheshire should learn how to manage money from Stockport council £700 is a joke , surely they also shop the wrong places and they insure for all the wrong things. What admin costs!! Please be serious. What are we insuring for ? equipment, surely not!
I suggest the council goes back to basics . It's time to re-structure the east Cheshire council and sack the people at the top who clearly can't do the job and have little intelligence as it would be sorted by now.I have been saying this, it's free and very simple and very clear to me.
Perhaps we should join Stockport only as suggestion if you can't come up with anything or than sandbach example.