Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Haringey councils million pound plus disappearing trick
Apparently Haringey council have blown ALOT of this money before they built anything (from this fund below) and can’t really build much now …
https://www.haringey.gov.uk/regeneration/wood-green/adaptive-wood-g...
Where did it go? Four public consultations later …
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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You seem to know what was said at the consultations so perhaps you could tell us?
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Permalink Reply by Finsbury Park Ranger on
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The last consultation the council said there is ‘little money left’. However all the other consultations were full of illustrated board with plans, of which from my memory, nothing has been built.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Don't rely on memory.
On becoming a councillor I used cheap digital cameras to photograph and occasionally video stuff such as e.g. potholes, dumping etc.
And boards with misleading nonsense.
This was some Poverty Denial on a Haringey display board in 2014.
I also recorded some of the verbal stupidities they came out with.
Many people now have smartphones which are capable of these democratic functions.
Plainly this scared incompetent bureaucrats as they tried to block me emailing this stuff. Their attempts at censorship failed as soon as the use of cheap cameras caught on; and then when smartphones were widely adopted.
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Finsbury Park Ranger, instead of simply repeating your allegations, you might want to consider asking them as questions - eg. under the Freedom of Information Act. Maybe the answers will provide substantial evidence to support your viewpoint that massive waste has taken place of £2million.
And - if I understand you correctly - that the cost of four meetings was hundreds of thousands. And that how money was spent had little or no relationship to the views of residents.
I don't assume you're wrong. And indeed in the past I have seen a phenomenon called "Maslow's Hammer" (also known as The Law of the Instrument). It describes a process when people are heavily biased towards action within their own limited fields of knowledge and skills, so they propose a "toolbox" as what's needed to solve any problem presented.
If you were in Tottenham after the 2011 riot you may have seen some examples. We heard mentoring agencies suggest a need to fund more mentors. Trainers proposed more training. Therapists came to offer therapy. We had a well known architectural practice who came for a while; and got free premises and a few contracts. Plus a property developer who recommended large scale property development. One or two of these purported benefactors were able to define the agenda and control resources - imposing actions and policies they favoured.
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That’s my point really with the Haringey practice of consultations, they seem to throw large amounts of residents money doing them, then the consultations tend to show the need to do ‘Y’ and the council then chose to go large doing ‘Z’.
After four consultations we shouldn’t have to ask each other what was said at the consultations, the full results should be clear for all to see and so should the money spent so far.
How does someone request a freedom of information act question and what is key to be mindful of when applying for one? I might just put one in.
Also what happened to the million pound funding to make nice the scary tunnel near the new river flats?
I swear they just draw up inspirational plans up (of things they won’t really do) just before an election and then bin the day they win.
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Permalink Reply by Straw Cat on
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Fill in the form at https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/select_authority
It will send it for you and make it public with any answer!
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"I swear they just draw up inspirational plans (of things they won’t really do) just before an election and then bin the day they win."
To "swear" you believe something is so, doesn't thereby make it so.
The next London Borough elections are in 2026. I doubt Haringey councillors or staff are planning that far forward. Even if they had the wish, or time, or funds to "draw up inspirational plans" right now.
You tell us that you and some twenty-eight other people went to the four consultation events. What was your own proposal? Did you write something? Or make a drawing? Or maybe took along some photos of projects you've seen elsewhere which you thought Haringey might adopt? Did you scribble your ideas on post-it notes?
Or, very reasonably, did you simply describe some of your own practical ideas/amendments of proposals, to one of the staff who then wrote this down?
Once or twice I took part in a small scale charrette-style event. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charrette) It collected up and produced a list of some interesting ideas from the residents who participated.
I'd be interested to learn your personal proposals for spending the cash available.
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I did one of those events back when I managed Highgate Road estate in Kentish Town in the eighties. We set up a big tent and spent the whole weekend there with tenants planning what environmental improvements they wanted for the estate with a sum of money I’d bid for. I think it was called Planning for Real back then - I had no idea I was doing a Charrette!
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Michael, I claim no expertise on Charrettes. It's a framework and a set of creative tools and processes that I've read about. And in which I've seen strong similarities to my own research experience and reading, on and with, collaborative and collective work teams.
I met Tony Gibson the founder of Planning for Real and tried to learn from him and his published work. My wife (Zena Brabazon) once involved him in a Planning for Real Design Competition at the south eastern corner of Finsbury Park.
My impression of Gibsons's Planning for Real methods was that their most prominent feature was to work "bottom-up". To the extent that residents CAME FIRST. Whereas in the charrettes residents were valued and respected partners. But the planners and designers, and architects and artists still had the major input.
This and similar videos may give a flavour.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sojaFUzXlYo -
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All I want really is a nice long bush on the fence line between Wood Green common and station road to give some protection from the pollution and allow some illusion that you might not be sitting next to a main road. I suggested it, wrote on things, talked to people in person at two events. Still nothing. It was clear that people wanted more biodiversity.
Also if you are planning to plant it should be the first thing you do not the last to give the plants time to come into their own. Nothing has been planted.
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Why not email and ask the Parks staff about future plans for planting there? Or if you've done that, what was their reply?
As I'm sure you know, bearing in mind that perhaps not everyone favours bushes and hedges shielding parkland. (Sadly, for our own nearest park that has included for safety reasons.)
Is there a Friends of Wood Green Common Group who could be helpful? -
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I’m talking about the 2022 election (the last ones anyway) when they flaunted all these nice plans around that now suddenly this can’t happen because they are suddenly skint.
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