Empress Ward Community Partnership Open Forum

Police in Farnborough are taking steps to make the neighbourhood safer and they want you to get involved by attending the Empress Ward Community Partnership Open Forum.
The forum will give residents the opportunity to meet the local policing team and other partner agencies and raise any concerns or issues they may have.
Beat manager for Farnborough town centre and Empress neighbourhood, PC Lee Jeffers, said: “I would like to introduce myself and my colleague, PC Beverley Woodhead, as the Safer Neighbourhood Team police officers, dedicated to the Empress and town centre neighbourhoods of Farnborough.
“Safer Neighbourhoods was introduced in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight this year and is our commitment to improving your quality of life by working together with partners and targeting the issues that you identify as those that matter.“A Safer Neighbourhood Team can be made up of police officers, police community support officers (PCSOs), community wardens, special constables, volunteers and partners, all working together in partnership.“Your Safer Neighbourhoods team is committed to dealing with your problems and priorities on a community based level.“By inviting the community to our open forum and engaging with residents I hope that people will feel happy and able to approach either myself or PC Woodhead with any concerns they may have.
“The Empress Ward Community Partnership Open Forum will be held on Tuesday, October 2, from 7pm at Rushmoor Borough Council Offices on Farnborough Road.“At the forum you will be able to meet your local policing team, discuss any concerns you may have and hear about the community work which is already progressing in your community.”
If you are not a resident in the town centre or Empress neighbourhood but would like information on community engagement events in your area, please contact your local beat team on 0845 045 4545 or visit the local policing pages of the Hampshire Constabulary website at www.hampshire.police.uk.

Recycling Facts and costs for Rushmoor

Every year, the average dustbin contains enough unrealised energy for 500 baths, 3500 showers or 5,000 hours of television. [source: www.assurre.org]

Aluminium

Amazingly, recycling it requires only 5% of the energy it takes to make new aluminium – and produces only 5% of the CO2 emissions. [source:www.alupro.org.uk]

Steel

Producing steel from recycled material saves 75% of the energy needed for steel made from virgin material [source: www.scrib.org ]
Every steel can is 100% recyclable. It can be recycled over and over again into products like bicycles and of course new cans [source: www.recycle-more.co.uk ]


Glass

Glass can be recycled again and again without losing its clarity or purity [source: www.britglass.co.uk ]
· Making glass bottles and jars from recycled ones saves energy. The energy saving from recycling one bottle will: - Power a 100 watt light bulb for almost an hour - Power a computer for 20 minutes - Power a colour TV for 15 minutes - Power a washing machine for 10 minutes [source: www.britglass.co.uk ]
Probably the most important thing about recycling glass is the energy saving – when using recycled glass to make new containers, 315Kg of CO2 is saved for every tonne of recycled glass used. [source: "Glass Recycling - Life Cycle Carbon Dioxide Emissions. A Life Cycle Analysis Report". Prepared for British Glass by Enviros Consulting Ltd November 2003.]


Plastic Bottles

Recycling just one plastic bottle saves enough energy to power a 60W light bulb for six hours [Source: Recoup]

Paper

70% less energy is required to recycle paper compared with making it from raw materials.

Sale of recyclate

Last year, the Council had an income of £46,500 from sale of blue bin material.

Impact of recycling on the larger environmental debate

It is difficult to find factual information on this topic, however to give some indication, this statement was released by the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP).

Current UK recycling saves 10-15 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent greenhouse gases a year. This is equivalent to taking 3.5 million cars off the road. By recycling, everyone can make a difference on climate change. [Source: WRAP, May 2006]

Waste Collection Costs

Broadly speaking, the costs of waste collection in Rushmoor (based on the figure
reported in our Council Tax leaflet) is £2,084,000.

Moving to AWC alone would save £138,200 in collection costs, plus an additional £20,000 of income from additional recycling

Moving to smaller bin emptied weekly would cost the Council approximately £120,000 in collection costs, plus £36,000p.a. capital equivalent for new bins and generate an estimated £17,000 income from additional recycling

Fortnightly kerbside glass would cost the Council approximately £269,500 p.a.

New Council "report it on-line" link

The Council have launched a new "report it on line" web link.
Unfortunately it is not the most obvious of links on the very cluttered front page of the Council Web site. So I have reproduced it here as a hyperlink

Report-it

It is a very good idea - just needs a little higher profile!

Farnborough Town Centre (click image to enlarge)

Foot & Mouth Update from Rushmoor's Chief Executive

There have been a few developments since my last message. We remain within the outer Surveillance Zone which extends to a range of 10kms around the two inner Protection Zones near Pirbright. This has no real impact on daily life within the Borough although all livestock movements remain banned which has led to closure of the Abattoir in North Camp.
Following tests which proved negative, the land at Hawley Meadows has been re-opened and no changes are proposed currently to the boundary of the Surveillance Area.
It was announced this morning that a temporary Protection Area had been declared around a farm near Dorking where some animals had shown symptoms but this could yet turn out to be a false alarm. Indeed early indications are that this is the case.
Legionnaires Disease
There has also been coverage in the national press about the possibility of a link between the laboratory in Pirbright which is at the centre of the Foot and Mouth outbreak and some recent cases of Legionnaires Disease amongst residents in North Hampshire and Surrey. I can confirm that our colleagues in Environmental Health have been involved in an investigation into a small cluster of Legionnaires' Disease cases in Surrey and North Hampshire and are working with the Health Protection Agency and Consultants in Communicable Disease Control for Hampshire and Surrey. Recent press coverage suggests that the laboratory has been cleared of any direct involvement but it is important to recognise that Legionnaires' Disease is caused by a type of bacterium that is widely found in the environment. If the organism is inhaled in aerosol form it can cause the disease.
Across the UK, there has been a sharp rise in the number or cases, up 60% since 2005. More information is available on Legionella at http://www.hpa.org.uk/infections/topics.ax/legionella/menu.htm
I would stress though that there is absolutely no cause for concern, the numbers are small and considerable effort is being put into isolating the cause.