Public meeting about the anti-social behaviour caused by residents of Devonshire Hall
ASB
What’s that helicopter costing us ?
I wonder if anyone at West Yorkshire Police has ever weighed the cost of such aircraft against their benefits i.e has any cost benefit analysis been carried out to determine whether we’re getting value for money. One of the costs taken into account by cost benefit analysis is the “opportunity cost”. In the case of a police helicopter, the opportunity cost might be the number of policemen you could have instead of the helicopter. To work this out, all you need to know is the annual cost of running the helicopter, and a policeman’s salary. You then divide the running cost by the salary figure to determine how many bobbies on the beat the helicopter is costing us. According to West Yorkshire Police, the helicopter they use is an MD902 Explorer, and it’s in the air annually for 1,400 hours. According to consultants Conklin & de Dekker one of these helicopters has a variable operating cost per hour of $919 (£576). That means the helicopter has an annual variable operating cost of £806,400. To arrive at the helicopter’s total cost, you’d add on fixed costs such as the salary of the three man crew. This could be around £90,000 assuming the helicopter is manned by three constables earning £30,000, but it’s likely to be much more. So if the helicopter’s annual operating cost is £900,000, that would mean that instead of the helicopter, we could have 30 experienced police constables earning £30,000 per year, 39 new recruits earning £23,000 per year, or 56 PCSO recruits earning £16,000 per year.
In a letter to the Yorkshire Evening Post published earlier this year, Lib Dem councillor Martin Hamilton said that banning barbeques would divert the police away from other priorities. If spending just short of £1 million every year to keep a helicopter in the air is a police priority, then some people might say it’s time their priorities were re-evaluated.
References
West Yorkshire Police helicopter operating details
Conklin & de Dekker helicopter variable operating costs
Police pay scales
(Photo courtesy of Ulleskelf)
Councillors fear knock on effect on other parks
This produced the following response from the councillor with responsibility for Parks and Countryside :
John Procter (Con) Mick Lyons is right. A few years ago disposable barbeques weren’t available. They’re an emerging phenomenon – cheap and easy. Parks were to cater for people who didn’t have gardens. Young people in the flats that have been built in the city centre want to go and have a barbeque. Other areas with city centre parks also have problems with barbeques – we’re at the start of something. When large numbers of our constituents are demanding something, we’ve got to listen. How did we think we could stop this ?
As a result of Councillor Procter’s statement, Labour councillors expressed concern for the city’s other parks :
Brian Selby (Lab) John Procter says “this is an emerging issue.” Looking at the flats that have gone up in Roundhay, there should be a trial at Roundhay Park, and at Temple Newsam. This seems to be happening because students enjoy it. Is this why Woodhouse Moor has been allowed to go ? Are we saying it’s too difficult with so many students ? Isn’t this the law of taking the line of least resistance ?
Tom Murray (Lab) It’s worrying that John Procter said that this is an emerging problem which could affect all our parks. So our policy at this stage should be that we will enforce our current byelaws. I’ve heard from residents about the trial that they would like. It embraces all the things that John Procter’s trial does. We’re talking about education, signage, and education. We could market it as “Parks for picnics.” Looking at this picture, I don’t see any criminals. Enforcement would be easy. The message would be “We have parks for picnics, not parks for barbeques”.
Unofficial minutes of the Scrutiny Board meeting 16.9.09
(Photo courtesy of Simon Grubb)
It’s official – barbecuing on the Moor isn’t Green !
“I cannot agree with this scheme. Parks are not for having barbeques and it should be stopped.”
Councillor Blackburn and his colleagues have an excellent track record on environmental issues. In 2007, they left the ruling Lib Dem/Conservative coalition over their opposition to the council’s proposal to build an incinerator to dispose of the city’s rubbish. Their courageous stance on the incinerator proposal helped to persuade the council to abandon its plans and to choose a waste recycling system instead. It’s to be hoped that their clearly expressed opposition to the barbeque scheme will also be heeded.
The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide
But now, just as it seemed that the voice of protest had been silenced, fresh voices of dissent have begun to be raised in other parts of the city. Councillors in other wards who are free to speak their own minds are speaking out against the barbeque scheme, recognising that the attack on Woodhouse Moor, is also an attack on every park on the city.
Reflecting on all of this, reminds me of the closing lines of Longfellow’s poem “Loss and Gain” :
Defeat may be victory in disguise;
The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide.
Photo courtesy of mr * p
The double standards of our local police
“It may seem like a low-level crime to some but it ruins how an area looks and makes people feel unsafe. It is criminal damage on large scale, costing council taxpayers thousands of pounds to put right”
He’s not talking about barbeques on Woodhouse Moor which ruin the look of a huge part of our area and last year cost over £100,000 in fire engine call-outs. He’s talking about graffiti.
Local residents who are sick and tired of being unable to use their local park because of police inaction over anti social behaviour, have taken Inspector Jessup to task over his and his colleagues’ double standards. In a published reply to the inspector, Tony Green advises him that a few exemplary arrests would solve the anti social behaviour problem overnight. And Helen Graham asks the inspector how he can stand by and do nothing when there are people breaking the byelaws by barbecuing and leaving a horrible mess all over the park.
It’s time our local police realised that their behaviour on this issue is bringing their name into disrepute. Parking on double yellow lines doesn’t help either.
Updating our MP
Representatives from local community groups met earlier today with Leeds Central Member of Parliament Hilary Benn to update him on Leeds City Council’s barbeque proposal and consultation exercise. The last time we met Mr Benn was on the 1st May and there was much to tell him about that had happened since then, such as the revelation that the barbeque proposal had come from three multi agency meetings held last year from which local community groups had been excluded; that the minutes of these meetings showed that in May, June, and July last year, the fire brigade had been called out to Woodhouse Moor 52 times at a cost estimated to be in excess of £100,000; that statistical evidence based on Parks and Countryside’s own figures supports residents’ claims that the vast majority of them had failed to receive survey forms, and that Leeds City Council’s Scrutiny board has ignored this evidence and the testimony of residents and given the consultation exercise the rubber stamp of its approval.
Mr Benn re-iterated his opposition to the barbeque proposal saying ” I think that it’s a very bad idea and I hope that the council won’t go ahead with it” and promised to do all he can to help the community in its efforts to get the scheme scrapped and the byelaws upheld. To this end, he gave us his permission to publish a letter he sent more than two months ago to Leeds City Council’s Chief Executive setting out his reasons for opposing the scheme, and saying that enforcement of the existing barbeque ban is the best option.
Cashing in on our parks
In the Parks and Greenspace Strategy published earlier this year, Leeds City Council set out the ways it wants to make money from our parks. Since the strategy didn’t go into detail, it left us wondering how it would be implemented. Then a few weeks ago, Parks and Countryside showed that making money out of parks doesn’t have to mean selling off or leasing assets, or setting up chargeable facilities. it can be done by hiring our parks out to television companies who want to film there. That’s what happened recently to Hanover Square when independent television literally took over the Square for several weeks while they carried out filming for a new drama series. The marquee shown above was one of their props.
During the course of filming, the road at the bottom of the square was almost impassible as one side of it became a car park for the heavy lorries needed to store the equipment required for filming. Even though the lorries were partly parked on the pavement, the police and civil enforcement officers did nothing to enforce the law which makes it an offence to mount the kerb. And neither was any action taken when the production company flloodlit the entire square so that filming could continue into the early hours of the morning. Night literally became day for the residents of Hanover Square. Just another example of Leeds City Council’s lack of respect for local residents and their determination to exploit this area for all it’s worth. And when the tarmac cracks on the pavement at the bottom of Hanover Square, who will pay to repair the damage?
