Town Councillors Unhappy With Organisation of Market Town Regeneration Fund
At Monday night's Town Council meeting the main topic up for discussion was going to be the Market Town Regeneration Fund . This was supposed to have been a pot of money from Central Bedfordshire Council that local Town Councils could bid for, provided they could find funding to match it. Houghton Regis Town Council scrabbled their staff and councillors into extra meetings to do what they could to put together a shopping list of enhancements that they would like to use the money for. The funding criteria was that the projects would be deliverable, showing a clear vision of business, economic, social and cultural impacts and good return on investment. As the successful bids began to be announced it became clear that some Towns had put in bids for things such as a Splash Park in Dunstable, and a Heritage Trail in Ampthill. It could be argued that provided such things were in the town centre areas, then they could increase footfall to the town centre and thus regenerate them.