Before any major development and financial impingement takes place it is right and proper that everything entailed is laid bare to the public – the ratepayers – on the basis of face-to-face dialogue.

At March there are pressing needs. Vandalism by the fly-by-night generation is a curse affecting the town.

The council should come to grips with the police over this matter.

If the police can patrol in daytime, surely some arrangement can cover the worst affected areas between midnight and 5am, after which vandals are usually stressed out by over-indulgence and other forms of self destruction?

Let's see some old-fashioned coppering for a change.

Empty shops do nothing to embellish confidence. Without a thriving commercial centre a town can die. Ever-increasing business and service rates, much greater than domestic demands, are a millstone around proprietorial necks.

There should be special consideration. In the face of current economical problems cannot the council generate initiative and put a hold on commercial rate increases? Incentive is the answer.

Furthermore the council should re-assess the needs of its departments.

Bureaucracy spawns bureaucracy and excessive staffing and inappropriate financial reward, typical in the civil service, are recognised facts.

Such over-weighted monopolies do nothing to loosen the ligature around the necks of the electorate and encourage those with entrepreneurial skills.

Councils should familiarise the electorate with the facts. After all, people power creates power behind leaders, officers and councillors aptly described but seldom seen as servants of the community.

Trevor Bevis,
St Peter's Road,
March.