OKEHAMPTON Chamber of Trade needs to re-engage with the businesses it seeks to represent ? that was the message which came out of last week?s meeting of the chamber. Ken Marsden, who runs Now & Then furniture shop in Okehampton, said the chamber needed to do more to show people it was fighting for issues that were the major problems faced by business people in the town ? namely traffic and car and coach parking. ?Those issues are causing serious problems to businesses and there is nothing I can see that anyone is doing about it,? he said. ?I have lost count of the number of people that have said ?I would like to look around your shop but we have got to get back to the car park?,? Mr Marsden said. The chamber last week launched an appeal for more members to help fund the annual Christmas lights and Edwardian Evening. The September meeting of the chamber last Thursday evening addressed ways of recruiting more members and boosting funds. Mr Marsden said issues such as membership packages and incentives were peripheral to those that really affected traders in the town. Mr Marsden also suggested the chamber might appoint area or street reps. Their role would be to feedback information and decisions from the chamber meetings to other businesses in their area, such as Red LIon Yard or the Arcade for example. Chairman of the chamber Richard Appleby said the chamber had been continuing to lobby the authorities for improvements in the traffic situation and for a designated coach park to be found in the town. Mr Appleby said: ?Since taking over as chairman, coach parking has been right at the top of my agenda.? However, he conceded the chamber may have some work to do to raise its profile and make people more aware of its position on these issues. Maurie Webber, curator of the Museum of Dartmoor Life, said she had spoken to coach firms who wanted to come to Okehampton but were put off because there was nowhere to park in the town itself. There has been no dedicated coach parking area in the centre of Okehampton since the town lost its coach park in School Way when Waitrose was opened. Mrs Webber said: ?It is not just the museum which is affected, we are all missing out on visitors who would spend money in the town.? The idea of holding meetings at alternative venues around the town to try and draw in a wider variety of business people was also considered by the committee.
