TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN.
Recently, I requested that STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL remove a shabby-looking holly tree which was obscuring my good view from the kitchen window of my home onto the busy road, so I could look out & keep a check on my vehicle when it was parked.
The felling of this holly tree would have been a simple task for STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL & what I consider would have been a gesture of goodwill on their part.
The answer I received today from STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL, was that the holly tree was ‘low risk’ and not in current need of any work.
This got me thinking.
When I was a young adult of about 17 years, I applied for a STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL rented property. At the age of 24, I had no reply from them & moved out of town to pursue the reading of an Engineering degree at the University of Warwick.
While I was away, STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL sold the land associated with both my primary & secondary schools to private housing developers.
*NOTE
When I returned from the University of Warwick in 1991, I sadly became considerably unwell & was under the ‘Care in the Community’ policies of the then Conservative ‘Thatcherite’ government.
This government policy in my opinion was ill-conceived.
The main local psychiatric hospitals were abandoned to property developers & the NHS patients were left to fend for themselves; there was no rented property or support facilities set aside to house or assist these NHS patients. Luckily there were a few charities, church organisations & concerned patient relative groups that stepped in to save the majority of these people from a lifetime of being abused in pubs & begging on the streets.
STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL DID NOTHING TO ASSIST.
STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL’S inaction has caused a considerable degree of discomfort in terms of physical pain & emotional & psychological distress.
Eventually, I got housed in 1992.
In those bleak days, social services were in a position to get involved & they, along with mental health support teams & psychiatric professionals (who wrote numerous letters to STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL HOUSING DEPARTMENTS) pressured STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL so that STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL had no option but to react.
Since being housed by STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL, I have noted that areas, where I grew up happily & played as a child, have been sold to another district council (NORTH HERTS COUNCIL) for private housing developments. STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL also sold the site of Stevenage College, where I once studied, to ASDA & rebuilt a smaller version of the college elsewhere!
Every aspect of my childhood memories; preschool, primary school spaces & secondary school spaces, college spaces & also where I played happily as a child has been sold off for profit to the highest bidder by these greedy STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCILORS & their numerous cronies without due care.
This has made my life in the town of Stevenage where I grew up, an isolated & miserable experience, leaving me with continuous feelings of wishing to leave, yet without any realistic means to do so.
Furthermore, for the greedy STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL to keep their coffers topped up, they have flooded the neighbourhood markets with other different people who, while appearing to have good intentions, lack proper genuine English communication skills & also, in terms of food, foist upon us the same scenario of unhealthy cheap food-products, packed full of sugar, salt & fat, commonly found today in the rest of the supermarkets of the UK.
It is also apparent that these different people do not reinvest any of their profits in our communities.
“So what”!, you say; it’s just a shabby holly tree. The feeling of despair I have for STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL grows deeper than any shallow holly tree roots.
I came to the NEW TOWN of Stevenage with my parents at the age of 9 months. My parents believed that there was a good prospect here for working, living & raising a family & while I have many happy childhood memories, by the age of 20 & after working in this town for several years, my happiness was trodden under the inglorious boot of STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL’s unmindful greed.
*FOOTNOTE
Just before the turn of the millennium I volunteered for The STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL ‘TREE WARDEN SCHEME’; I was encouraged to do, so to gain some meaningful use of my time & to give back locally in a positive way.
We planted trees all over Stevenage (STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL must have had their coffers overflowing with a CENTRAL GOVERNMENT grant).
Our time & hard work as Tree Wardens were freely given, & we were responsible to the Chief Arboricultural Officer of STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL at the time.
As part of our volunteer description, we were to report street lamps that were not functioning & also report damaged & vandalised trees.
I cycled around the town of Stevenage for years looking at trees & street lighting.
In 2010, I was required to make a report regarding a few fallen local trees. When I reported the matter to STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL, none of their staff had heard of the TREE WARDEN SCHEME (Which I remember was partly funded by THE NATIONAL GRID).
Not only that, when I asked to speak to the Chief Aboricultural officer, I was dismayed to understand from STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL staff that the Chief Aboricultural Officer had long retired.
STEVENAGE BOROUGH COUNCIL did not even have the decency to inform their volunteer that the scheme had ceased to be active.
Written by Mr. Sean P. Ransom, on the 6th of June 2024 at 10:25 P.M.
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