Time to wake up

I do hope the deputy chief executive of East Devon District Council has read the front page of the Exmouth Herald which came out on Friday, March 30: “Grant cash for halls.”

Devon County Councillor Roger Croad said: “I am pleased that this money (£400,000) will help improve such facilities (community centres and village halls) and ensure community buildings will continue to be available for our residents to make good use of for years to come.”

Well, at least the county council has a public-spirited approach, unlike our district council which now seems hell-bent on reducing services while spending large sums of money making Exmouth into a theme park. Only EDDC could think of selling a prize piece of land in a major market trough! But where is our town council in all of this? Are they all on an extended vacation? Or have they been bullied into submission by district?

Only last week, the Journal carried photographs of Sport Relief with many children on a running track at the rugby ground, which EDDC wants to bury forever under Tarmac and concrete with a supermarket.

These children had all got to this lovely estuary-side green space on their own two feet under expert staff supervision. If Mr Cohen gets his way, children from the town’s schools of The Beacon, Exeter Road and St Joseph’s will all have to be coached off somewhere out of town to allow EDDC staff to go shopping where children used to run or enjoy the Rotary Club’s amazing fireworks display.

If the truth were known (and not too late), I very much doubt whether more than a small minority of Exmouth’s 30,000 inhabitants are even aware of EDDC’s Masterplan and an even smaller number of people in favour of it; were it not for The Journal, I would not know of its existence.

Come on, Exmouth, wake up! Start writing letters to your MP, town councillors and newspapers but don’t waste your valuable time with EDDC; they’re not really interested in what the people of Exmouth want. They are about to sell off your family’s silverware right under your noses!

John Harlock

via email.