Street lighting to be paid for by residents
RESIDENTS in parts of Sevenoaks will be asked to pay for their own street lighting as the town council reviews its budget.
The measure comes as Sevenoaks town councillors look to save the £6,000 annual cost of the street lighting in privately-maintained roads.
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PRIME LOCATION: Wildernesse Avenue, one of the most exclusive private roads in the country, where a Russian billionaire is rumoured to have bought three properties. NEIL PALMER NP1301042_2.
Some of the roads in Sevenoaks, notably Wildernesse Avenue, Kippington, Woodside and Oakhill Roads, are maintained by groups of residents, instead of being the responsibility of Kent County Council.
Chairman of the finance and general purposes committee Robert Piper explained the council had agreed in principle to pass over the maintenance of street lights in unadopted roads to these groups of residents.
He said: "We have already passed street-lighting to Oak Hill Road and Kippington Road residents. We want to talk to other residents' associations to see if they would be interested in taking the responsibility.
"It gives them more choice and it will give them the opportunity of upgrading them to heritage lights. With us they only get bog standard ones."
See this week's Chronicle for the full story
Comments
by Ranter, Sevenoaks
Friday, March 12 2010, 9:34AM
“But will the council tax go down? I'd like to know how much outstanding rent and council tax is still owed to Sevenoaks council? I'd also like to know how many non-jobs will also be going. Cuts have to be made but I don't hear of any real inititatives to reover monies owed and to reduce spending on non-essential posts. I'm sure some areas will still get subsidised lighting though. If we all weren't tgaxed at every opportunity and had a real say in what we spent our money on then perhaps this wouldn't be such a bad idea.”