Wandsworth challenge
Wandsworth Challenge is changing the way the council provides services and works with local people.
The council wants to make the most of the new freedoms offered by the government, and set its own agenda for change. We want to be innovative, radical and genuinely responsive to local needs.
The Wandsworth Challenge help us deliver the savings we must make, but by finding new, more efficient methods that give power to community groups and residents. This will enable us to keep the standard of local services high.
The council will talk to local people to find out what their priorities are, then find a way of delivering results together. The leader's Let's Talk programme of meetings in supermarkets and on community websites has helped him meet local residents and answer their queries and concerns. More meetings are planned.
What are we doing?
We are revolutionising our approach to social housing, prioritising hard-working famililies and helping people find deposits.
We are working with groups of residents to help them set up their own free schools.
We are making it easier for people to access our services 24/7 online, such as libraries, and council tax accounts.
Responsibility for public health is being transferred to local council control from the health service.
We are changing the way we work with some of the borough's most challenging families - those where social problems transfer from one generation to the next - through our community budgets programme.
Responsibility for keeping borough parks safe will move from the council's own Parks Police to the Metropolitan Police.
What are you doing?
Many of you are volunteering your time to help others through our new agency, Volunteering Wandsworth.
Local people are working with the council to find a 'big society' way to run York Gardens library in Battersea.
Green Champion award winners around the borough are showing the rest of us how to be green.
Residents have saved the council hundreds of thousands of pounds in disposal costs by producing less waste.
Dozens of street parties have helped to bring communities closer together.
Neighbours have been helping to keep each other safe through the new area-based Neighbourhood Watch scheme.
Several community-based green schemes have received a share of our £500 Eco-fund pot.
Will there be any money for community groups?
The Big Society Fund is a pot of money available to community groups, residents' associations and other grassroots groups to help make things happen with a minimum of red tape.
£169,000 will be available to support grassroots organisations that carry out schemes that enhance people's quality of life, take greater responsibility for the fabric of their neighbourhoods or improve local services by devising new and better ways of delivering them.
Community groups that undertake projects to help improve the quality of life for the borough's most deprived citizens will be given priority for this funding.
To register your interest please email: wbsf@wandsworth.gov.uk
How can I suggest ideas?
Put your comments and suggestions using the Wandsworth Challenge form. They will be forwarded to the relevant council department.
You do not have to give us your name and contact details, but if you do we will be able to respond to you.
Brightside will run regular updates on how ideas have been progressed.
You can also chat to the leader at one of a series of Let's Talk sessions online and at venues around the borough.
