Last night 14 people gathered to plan a tricky and ambitious project. There was a real buzz as we battled through a list of 11 items all requiring action in the future.
There was no hesitation with people to offer suggestions and take on jobs.
These were people who in real life take on responsibility on a daily basis. They do not enjoy just talking about doing things, they just want the when, where and how settled so that they can move on to the next item for discussion.
This was a group with people who had never met. With some of the others though there was a solid base of trust from people who knew from previous experience they were with people you could depended on. There was lots of laughter and chat with at the same time getting through the items quickly.
So we came away with the satisfaction that a successful event was to take place because of the work that had been agreed.
This, thankfully, was a gathering that was a total contrast to that which took place in the Ulverston Council Chamber only a week ago when tired apathetic politicians made every effort to avoid taking on responsibility and instead preferred to attack innocent people.
Here were a group of risk takers who were used to taking on difficult tasks which would give lots of pleasure to hundreds of people and no material or status benefit to the workers.
We all looked forward to a very rewarding experience based on hard work together, for no other reason that we thought this would be fun.
This all restores your faith in human nature!
14 comments:
I do hope this new group of doers does manage to get the bus shelters sorted out at Victoria road,it really needs doing, and I'm sure it will bring pleasure to lots of people. Maybe we tired and apathetic councillors will then realise that as we now have a group of doers sorting the town out we can all pack up and go home. We never got paid a penny either for what we didn't do so you'll never notice when we're gone.
I'm sure you're right, Colin.
I doubt that many people would notice if the majority of the councillors resigned.
I know that there are many people who get on and act as though they weren't there.
Take designing a web site for the town for instance. Look at www.visitulverston.com
Done by someone who has a real love for Ulverston who hasn't been paid a single penny for a lot of hard work. Its good stuff too.
Then again have a look at www.ulverstonuk.co.uk also done by another doer who didn't receive a single penny for his work.
In fact they both pay out money and did a lot of work in order to give something to Ulverston.
You've raised the issue in the Council Chamber that in these modern times, Ulverston needs a good web site. Well you've got the skills to do one. How about it.
Failing that at least support those that pull their figure out and work hard in spite of the lack of interest from the council.
Many in the town are stating that they would be better off doing various jobs themselves than endure the frustration of inaction from our Town Council.
Who puts the flower tubs in the Market Square - nothing whatsoever to do with any local council.
Who pick up litter and dog shit all the time when the public services don't. I've never seen a councillor do this.
not true geoff I have seen cllr Col on litter pics and Cllr marr on a canal cleanup
Be fair
It is true.
I have never seen a Councillor pick up litter.
This does not mean that they don't.
I'm glad that you have seen them and can say so here.(which is why this blog is valuable if it reflects a wider view and opinion).
Furthermore being on a litter pick doesn't count for as many Brownie Points!
Doing it when you aren't aware of anyone else looking; doing it most times you come across litter - as a matter of course; this is , for me, what really counts.
I have seen many picking people up litter in this way and very rarely even picking up other people's dog's shit. It certainly happens.
Ralph Spours certainly picks up litter - it goes with people who take pride in where they live.
No need to reinvent the wheel Geoff, have a look at http://www.ford-park.org.uk/tic/ulverston.htm,It's just a rough template but maybe we could work on something like this. And I do pick up litter and empty bins full of dog sxxt every week in Ford Park.
Your answer makes be angry if not very angry.
This a disgrace of a wheel and not the way to go.It's an uncoordinated gathering of bits and pieces. A disgrace if it were to be Ulverston's main site.It even points to "A private site - www.ulverstonuk.co.uk" which has outdated information - for 2009 on its list of events not what we want tourists to see.
Instead at poking at the problem, why aren't you providing leadership and heading a small group on the council to consider the problem and discuss with all the people in the town who collectively have far more wisdom as to how to deal with this issue than you alone.
The problem with councillors is that they (the majority) are not facilitators - bringing together the best in the town. Instead they have little humility and love poncing about because they and only they see themselves as important. They believe that they know the answers to what people want and have no need to learn from the experts in the town. (They clearly got it wrong about the abusive emails they received and relied on their crocodile brains to interpret the 'facts' and then responded characteristically.
They should be providing leadership in bringing together all the resources in the town. Not ducking every issue they can and throwing up their hands helplessly with the mantra "We can do nothing it's all controlled by Kendal".
This is not true in many cases and I can quote a few examples.
Furthermore why didn't you head a web site group on the council four years ago when the issue was raised so that the town could have benefited since then from a really good tourist information site.
BTW you site immediately puts across the wrong impression to the potential tourist - what is "Infomation" in your title.
This wheel has clearly been thrown together with miscellaneous collection of ill fitting spokes. It would be incapable of carrying anything other than a misguided councillor to the Town Beck where he would perhaps wake up.
Mind you great men have suffered a similar fate at the hands of Ulverstonians and lived on to make a large impression on the world - George Fox I believe.
I'm not surprised everyone wants to have a pop at you,the tone in your replys are a disgrace.There's only ever one view on here and that has to be your view and no one else matters as your always right
I agree I overreact and take extreme positions.
Having strong feelings on a subject is both an advantage and a disadvantage.
Reaching a balanced approach is difficult and some of my friends believe this is impossible with me.
They seem to learn how to cope with me - even people like Colin Williams!
I reckon people who want to make some allowances - none of us are totally irredeemable.
It's gratifying to see an increasing number of people identifying themselves on this blog.
This takes courage.
These people are to be respected.
Colin is one of these real people and one I hold in high regard.
It's good to have people who can cope with people who show emotion.
As you gather I get impatient with others who pussyfoot around and don't say or show what they really think.
Diplomatic to the nth degree - standing for nothing more than the consensus of people who avoid reality and taking any stand on anything. Their main concern is not to upset anyone and end up achieving nothing.
Of course I have views which is why I write this blog and everyone is welcome to disagree with me.
Should you want to be an author on this blog without creating havoc then you would be welcome.
It would be good to have differing opinions and views on other topics other than the ones I raise.
Colin wrote privately and explained his actions saying "I'm sorry you got angry about this, that was not my intention"
Thank you Colin. I still would be angry if a cobbled together web site was the outcome for a town web site. Especially as there is a group of people outside the council that are determined to provide the very best no matter what it costs them in time and emotional effort.
If the Ulverston Town Council don't want to get involved, I feel sad but we are better without them.
Agree you over reacted to Col which you've acknowledged, usually best to take a breather before responding, reread in a new light. My take on your reaction was you seeing the template as a close finished example when clearly it's stated that it was a rough template.
Looking at the 3 examples presented they are good efforts out of the starting blocks using old school web design which gave me an idea:-
Have a competition to design a website, get local businesses to donate to a prize fund of 1st £100, 2nd £50, 3rd £25 (maybe also other categories of prizes).
Give a high level brief for entrants to work to, also some T&C's to the effect that give right to Ulverston to use any part of a submission for the benefit of the town.
Brief could include:-
Must promote Ulverston, it's attractions, events etc..
Aim to make use of social to promote the site/Ulverston,
Must conform to current coding standards,
Be easily updatable by someone/s with no coding/technical knowledge,
Low cost.
Open the competition to everyone, get local schools/collages involved, get it in the gazette.
Form a judging panel consisting of locals and others with specialist knowledge of the parts of the brief
After the closing date publish the location of all the submitted websites and ask for comments from locals which will be made available for the judges to read.
Have the judges pick their top 3 best fitting the brief and an overall winner of the 3.
Have an awards night, get local media there, invite all entries and also have each of the top 3 do a short 5min presentation on their entry, have a local web/tourist expert give a short talk about what's great about each site and announce the overall winner.
Get all entries involved in taking the winning design forward plus any elements from other entries that got a high approval. Also form plan for the community to keep the site constantly up to date.
Launch to the media and the world
Google doesn't like me writing war and peace, comment in two parts.
Part 1
Agree you over reacted to Col which you've acknowledged, usually best to take a breather before responding, reread in a new light. My take on your reaction was you seeing the template as a close finished example when clearly it's stated that it was a rough template.
Looking at the 3 examples presented they are good efforts out of the starting blocks using old school web design which gave me an idea:-
Have a competition to design a website, get local businesses to donate to a prize fund of 1st £100, 2nd £50, 3rd £25 (maybe also other categories of prizes).
Give a high level brief for entrants to work to, also some T&C's to the effect that give right to Ulverston to use any part of a submission for the benefit of the town.
Brief could include:-
Must promote Ulverston, it's attractions, events etc..
Aim to make use of social to promote the site/Ulverston,
Must conform to current coding standards,
Be easily updatable by someone/s with no coding/technical knowledge,
Low cost.
Part 2
Open the competition to everyone, get local schools/collages involved, get it in the gazette.
Form a judging panel consisting of locals and others with specialist knowledge of the parts of the brief
After the closing date publish the location of all the submitted websites and ask for comments from locals which will be made available for the judges to read.
Have the judges pick their top 3 best fitting the brief and an overall winner of the 3.
Have an awards night, get local media there, invite all entries and also have each of the top 3 do a short 5min presentation on their entry, have a local web/tourist expert give a short talk about what's great about each site and announce the overall winner.
Get all entries involved in taking the winning design forward plus any elements from other entries that got a high approval. Also form plan for the community to keep the site constantly up to date.
Launch to the media and the world
Please note that I did not say that I overacted when I commented in reaction to Colin's statement.
I shall react to Dave's comments when I have more time to think clearly.
This could be this evening.
My reaction may not be very polite - we shall see!
I would like my reaction to be measured and thoughtful and maybe even thought provoking!
Now I've put myself on the spot.
This comment is supposed to be "measured, thoughtful and even thoughtprovoking".
That's a tall order.
So to business. I have reread my comment on Colin's web site. What readers need to realise is that Colin and I know each other quite well and share common ground as well as disagreeing. We get on well because we each can take the flack from the other. We talk eyeball to eyeball something most readers can't do.
He tells me he has removed it from site because it was a mistake to put it in public view (my words).
I believe I was right to be angry - very angry at the idea that this kind of site should serve the purpose of being a window of Ulverston for tourists.
By including almost everyone under the sun, it attempted not to offend anyone by leaving them out and thus created a hodgepodge of information; some of it good; some of it very poor - from a tourists point of view.
What I will continue to fight hard for is at least one really good site - from the tourists point of view - other sites can serve different puposes.
I say at least one because two really good ones would be even better.
The criteria is that they must be well designed etc etc.
There are several ways of achieving this, but I repeat cobbling a site together as suggested by Colin (because he feels there isn't the cash for an alternative) is NOT the way I will tolerate.
If it does happen we must make sure that it never achieves anywhere near the top spot on search engines like Google.
There is much more to this issue and it needs a presentation of its own.Furthermore there are other important issues which are attempting to be resolved behind closed doors - it's no use having a splendid site for Ulverston if people who have never heard of Ulverston never reach it. The approach for reaching tourists is far more complex.
As for Dave's comments - I can't identify with them as being something that would work at present in Ulverston. Someone might make it work but it won't be me - it's too far from what I see as reality.
This is not to say that someone else might make them work. New ideas can always be valuable to the right person.
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