Residents Unheeded on CCTV

AFTER an unsightly CCTV pole was erected without consultation in Henley last year, leading to a mass protest from residents for its removal, the parish council pledged that lessons had been learnt and such a failure in communications would not be repeated again.

However, while the public were this time invited to have their say on how and where CCTV cameras should be installed in the town at a meeting of Beaudesert and Henley Joint Parish Council on Monday night (16th February), there was a distinct feeling that the parish councillors had already made up their minds, leaving residents' comments unheeded.

Back in June last year, a new CCTV pole was removed from outside Barclays Bank on the High Street following widespread disapproval from residents on the grounds it was not only unsightly and out of keeping with the conservation area but a traffic hazard-obscuring the primary traffic light of the nearby pedestrian crossing.

A petition was signed by some 150 residents and presented to the authority responsible for erecting the pole without consultation-Stratford District Council. At the time, the parish council assured it had also not been consulted at the final stages.

On Monday night, parish council members voted to erect one CCTV camera on top of St John's Parish Church in High Street and another on a lamp post outside the police station. This followed a presentation from Robert Walsh, community services manager at Stratford District Council, in which he outlined the two most realistic options available to the town-installing cameras on buildings and erecting poles more in keeping with the surroundings.

The Stratford Herald - 19th February 2009