The North Central Cluster covers Gorse Hill & Pinehurst, Penhill and Western Wards. The map below illustrates the area covered.
The Cluster Chair is Cllr Kevin Small (pictured below) and the Cluster Lead is Ian Bickerton, Director of Access and Provision, Swindon Borough Council. For more information on Ian Bickerton and CPCP please click here.
North Central Cluster Meeting
We held a cluster meeting at the Even Swindon Community Primary School on Tuesday 27th September at 7pm until 9pm Local people came along and hear about important issues in their community including policing, housing and school places.
Love Your Street - Rodbourne
At the end of July we worked with the residents of Rodbourne to enable highway maintenance works to be carried out in the area. Residents were asked to move their cars so that drains could be cleared, pavements swept and lines repainted. Thankyou to all the local people who helped us out by moving their vehicles for the day.
Cluster Meeting 28th June 2011
Our latest public meeting was held on 28th June, 7-9pm at Gorsehill Infant School. People came along to influence what is going on in your local area. We discussed highways, waste and local policing. Full notes will be available soon.
Faith Leaders meeting
We recently held a meeting with local faith leaders and community representatives in Gorsehill
New Locality Base
A new locality base providing services to children, young people and families across the area is due to open in June at the former Uplands Primary School in Penhill.
Pinehurst Fun Day
This year's Pinehurst Fun Day will take place on Saturday 9th July.
Swindon Academy Public Meeting
We held a public meeting on Monday 21st March 2011 at the Swindon Academy. The meeting discussed community facilities in Pinehurst, shops at The Circle, Policing and Sure Start. People came along to Meet their Cluster Ward Councillors, Council Officers and local Police.
Penhill Public Meeting - 20th January 2011
There was a public meeting held at the John Moulton Hall in Penhill on Thursday 20th January 2011 from 7.00 pm. The meeting focussed on Image and Ambitions for the Penhill area. Everyone was welcome to share their views on how we can make a difference together.
Future Events in the North Central Cluster
Place Shaping Event 2nd November 2010 - 7.00 - 9.00 pm Gorse Hill Community Centre
There was a special meeting on Tuesday 2nd November at Gorse Hill Community Centre. Swindon Borough Council gave local residents the opportunity to set local planning priorities for their community. The information captured during this meeting was used to create priorities for the North Central Cluster in the emerging Core Strategy.
Week of Action
The North Central Cluster held a Week of Action which included the Police, Parking Officers and Anti-Social Behaviour Officers. Members of the community were given advice on safety from the Community Safety Partnership Team.
Intergenerational project – so what is it?
This project started from an idea about how to improve the relationship and understanding between older and young people, which would improve community cohesion and inclusion and use the arts as a tool to make it happen.. The project group consists of representatives from Children’s services, schools, Adult services, SBC Policy Unit, Housing, Culture and a local artist Toni Robinson from No Added Sugar. We are working with Year 6 pupils from Sevenfields School, Year 11 pupils from Kingsdown School and a group of older people who live in a variety of settings in Penhill. During three planned project sessions with these three groups, the task they will be undertaking together is making bunting from a variety of materials, to be displayed at Lydiard Park on the 10th July – for more information on the Big Arts Day and Big Arts Experiment please follow this link http://www.swindondoesarts.co.uk/the-big-arts-day
The first meeting of all three groups was held on Wednesday 19th May 2010 and was a great success! This project is being seen as a pilot to see if we really can achieve “attitudinal” change through collaborative working. We are evaluating all stages of the work, collecting evidence and data and the pupils are even producing a film to show what progress they have made. We know it is working as already twice as many older people have asked to join in session 2! The long-term outcome is to see if this type of work can be rolled out across communities through Connecting People Connecting Places and local groups encouraged to develop intergenerational projects of their own.
For more information on this project please contact: Helen Miah, Head of Culture, hmiah@swindon.gov.uk, (01793) 465353,Ian Bickerton ibickerton@swindon.gov.uk, Director, Access & Provision - Children Services, (01793) 465724 or James Griffin, Head of Policy, james.griffin@swindon.gov.uk (01793) 463648
Pinetrees Community Centre
Work is underway in the North Central Cluster to discuss the new Pinetrees Community Centre.
North Central Cluster meeting
The latest North Central Cluster meeting was held on Thursday 3rd December 2009 from 5.00 to 8.00 pm at the Even Swindon Community Centre.
This involved the three Western Ward Councillors, the Cluster Lead and a representative from the Community Engagement Team. Feedback was obtained from around 50 members of the local community on their key priorities. This will be fed into the development of a Cluster agreement for North Central.
North Central cluster held a Cluster Area Forum meeting on the theme of Healthy Community at the Gorse Hill Baptist Church in October 2009. The Forum had lots of stalls on issues regarding Health including Health Through Warmth and Health Issues relating to younger and older people.
The Cluster Lead has visited the Pinehurst Initiative Forum and the Pinehurst Community Forum and went along to the Pinehurst Fun Day.