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Council failed to do sums over moor proposal
WHERE is the cost-benefit analysis in support of designated barbecue areas ?
In their report to Leeds City Council's Executive Board dated October 8, 2008, Parks and Countryside accept that the use of barbecues on the moor causes damage to the park and is associated with antisocial behaviour. The report then states that their preferred solution to the problem is to restrict barbecuing to designated areas of the park, so as to contain the problem, rather than to prohibit it.
But the provision of designated areas alone will neither solve the problem, nor contain it. Continual monitoring will be needed to prevent barbecues being lit elsewhere than in the designated areas. At the same time, these areas will need continual maintenance and cleansing to ensure that they remain useable and do not become eyesores.
Since the report's authors have rejected the request for park wardens on the ground that this would "not be the best use of limited resources available in the budget", the report should provide evidence in the form of cost-benefit analysis, that the provision of designated areas would be a more effective use of resources than the provision of park wardens.
In the absence of such evidence, the proposal to establish designated barbecue areas should have been rejected by the Executive Board.
Instead, they've initiated a costly consultation exercise to gauge support for the proposal, an exercise which is itself flawed, just like the proposal.
Bill McKinnon, Kendal Walk, Leeds
In July last year, council and Leeds University staff met to discuss the problems on Woodhouse Moor. The minutes of that meeting have recently been made available.
They confirm that throughout May of 2008, the fire brigade was called out 29 times to put out fires on the moor; they were called out 18 times in June, and five times in July. That's 52 times in three months.
The Government estimates that it costs 1,970 a time to call out a fire crew. So that means that over 100,000 of ratepayers' money was spent last year putting out fires. To say nothing of endangering people's lives.
When people say that these fires must be banned, our councillors shake their heads sadly and insist that the council simply doesn't have the resources to enforce the ban. But with figures like these, can the council afford not to?
Ian Harker, Kensington Terrace, Leeds
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Friday 10 February 2012
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