Townwatch welcomes new committee

There was a good turnout for the Townwatch AGM on 25 February.

After 16 years as Chair of Townwatch, Alan Dove stepped down and a new committee was welcomed. Jamie Watson, General Manager of the soon to be opening Barbara’s Bier Haus, has taken the reins as Chair with support from three other representatives from the town centre’s night-time economy.

The new committee plans to strengthen working partnerships between industry representatives and stakeholders, such as the BID, Dorset Police and BCP Council, to form a taskforce that will identify key challenges and issues then formulate an action plan that will be the framework for projects in the coming year.

Some of the key decisions and dscussion points were as follows:

• The team reiterated the importance of reporting incidents onto SentrySis
• There was a unanimous vote in favour of changing the nighttime radio suppliers for a more efficient system
• The new bleed kits installed in town centre have had a positive response as well as the free training sessions offered to members
• There were calls for more defibrillators and so Townwatch will be funding THREE more
• Each year at the AGM the Townwatch committee donate £1000 to charity. This year the Town Pastors were the beneficiaries
• The Townwatch team aim to encourage more feedback from its members so will be sending out regular surveys for people to put their thoughts or questions forward ahead of the next meeting.

The next meeting is on Tuesday 1 April at Popworld.