Recently I attended Bedford School's event marking the next phase of its exciting project to convert the former St Luke's Church building on St Peter's Street into a brand new theatre for Bedford. The school hosted the awareness-raising event to mark the planning approval received for the project, with the focus now moving on to raising funds for the conversion and development of the theatre.
Earlier in the month I wrote on here about the all-party support for our 2013/14 Council budget, which in tough times saves services for residents, freezes annual Council tax once again and invests in schools and infrastructure. The budget was the subject of my monthly article in the Times and Citizen newspaper, which appeared in last week's edition. If you didn't see it, here's the full piece:
There was more good news in our drive to open up the Council to local residents last month, after we won approval for our proposals to remove the remaining restrictions on public questions at Full Council meetings. This means members of the public now have the same rights to ask questions at Council meetings as councillors, with the previous limit of six questions or 30 minutes scrapped from the rules within the Council's constitution.
Sunday night saw the official opening of 'Number Thirteen', the brand new 'front-of-house' facility for Bedford Corn Exchange and high quality new town centre cafe-bar. The Council has invested in the long-empty former Saracen's Head property in order to improve the experience for concert and gig-goers enjoying the Corn Exchange, and the new facility is already establishing itself as an attractive addition to that area of the town centre.
My latest monthly column for the Times and Citizen looked at the forthcoming opening in June of the redeveloped Higgins Bedford art gallery and museum. The opening of the major cultural attraction is an exciting development, and is just one of many coming up which are crucial for our town centre if it is to thrive in the future amidst of a series of extremely tough challenges for town centres right across the country. In case you missed it in the paper, here's a copy of the full article:
I have written here on numerous occasions about the importance for the borough of the final phase of the Bedford Western Bypass. It will bring numerous benefits, making Bedford even better connected, encouraging new economic growth and employment and quite simply making it easier for all road users to get around!
