Better Colchester Developments

June 2019

We reaffirmed our plans to deliver up to 350 new affordable homes for local people on Colchester City Council’s housing waiting list over the next seven years. This will include delivering 100 affordable homes as part of developments totalling 300 homes across sites at Creffield Road, Military Road, Mill Road and St Runwald Street; building around 35 new homes on former garage sites buying back up to 50 properties across five years using the Right to Buy clauses on former council homes and a further 100 over five years on the open market; and looking at alternative ways of delivering social housing.

We committed £30,000 to help tackle crime and anti-social behaviour in rural areas. The funding application process will be launched in September 2019 when the council, supported by the Safer Colchester Partnership, launches its new Rural Crime Toolkit.

We completed work on three new drinking water fountains for Colchester town centre.

We announced our work with English Heritage to respond to concerns from visitors, residents and businesses who use St Botolph’s Priory and the surrounding open space. This involved adding more permanent security to the site to tackle anti-social behaviour and to also be on hand to provide a welcoming presence in the Priory, providing information and advice to visitors.

We supported West Mersea Town Council with £15,000 to refurbish the public toilets at Victoria Esplanade. The grant contributed to the overall £32,000 project funded by a combination of other sources including through West Mersea Town Council.

August 2019

In partnership with Culver Square and the Our Colchester BID, we installed 150 brightly coloured umbrellas in Culver Square.

We launched a new campaign aimed at taking a harder approach to those who fly tip in our city.

We launched a new ‘Ask Mark’ project inviting city residents and businesses to email questions to the leader of the council.

September 2019

We supported celebrations of diversity in Colchester with contributions to the Rice and Spice festival and events to celebrate Black History month in October.

We reported that gum litter blighting Colchester’s pavements has reduced. Following an extended programme of town centre cleaning, the introduction of Gumdrop bins and the Gum Litter Blows marketing campaign, the amount of gum litter in some areas of town has reduced by as much as 81% in some areas!

October 2019

We were ranked joint top performer in the Eastern Region and equal third most climate-friendly area in England and Wales, according to Friends of the Earth. The green group assessed councils in different categories including renewable energy, public transport, lift-sharing, energy efficiency at home, waste recycling, and tree cover.

We marked National Rural Crime Week of Action (6 to 13 October) by launching the Rural Crime Toolkit and funding application process.

We announced the Colchester Woodland Project, which plans to plant 200,000 trees across the city over the next five years, helping to offset 32,000 tonnes of carbon in the lifetime of the trees.