RESULTS of a ground-breaking survey into life in Bere Alston were released at a public meeting in the village recently, which organisers hope will provide a new spirit of optimism in the community.
The Bere Alston Together survey was commissioned by West Devon Community Safety Partnership. The village was identified as a good area for investigation due to its proportionately high levels of crime compared with other villages of similar size in the borough and followed a petition calling for a ban on street drinking.
Nick Payne, the borough council?s head of environment services and member of the partnership, said: ?We are very pleased with the response to the survey, more particularly in that we seem to have initiated a sincere commitment from significant numbers of local people to actually start getting to grips with the issues in Bere Alston, and start sorting them out ? that?s the most encouraging thing.
?Hopefully, we can assist people to make Bere Alston an even better place in which to live.?
Mr Payne said the survey, sent to 933 addresses and with a a return rate of 38%, was completed by three population groups, adults, teenagers and children, and investigated community involvement, crime and quality of life.
?From a statistical point of view, it?s a very robust sample and what comes out of it can be taken to be very representative of the community as a whole,? said Mr Payne.
The survey revealed that 74.9% of adults indicated community spirit was fairly or very good ? 50% of teenagers felt this way.
Just over 92.1% of adults felt either very or fairly safe during the day in Bere Alston, as opposed to 71.7% of the youth respondents.
Adults felt the greatest anti-social or criminal behaviour in the village was dog fouling, followed by under-aged drinking and dangerous driving. As far as young people were concerned, their greatest concern was drunken behaviour, followed by vandalism.
More activities or facilities for young people was the most frequently identified measure by the youth respondents. Mr Payne said a youth club was ?the single biggest thing young people want?.
He said 63.2% of youth respondents would be willing to join any new group ? and he was particularly pleased to see that 30.9% of them would be willing to help out such a group, with 17% of adults willing to offer occasional support, 6.7% regular support.
A public meeting has been arranged on July 24 to take the issues identified in the survey forward.
Mr Payne said the survey results could also be used by organisations like the Market and Coastal Towns Initiative as concrete evidence that funding would be justified for certain projects.
Mr Payne said as far as the borough council is concerned, it would use the survey results to help the dog warden target specific areas where fouling is a problem. A street drinking ban is also likely to be introduced later this year.
The public meeting is due to start at 6pm in the village hall ? all are welcome.