Rebecca Behrendt on Street Clutter, Committee’s and Community

It’s all in a day’s work for the new Chiswick Area Co-ordinator

Rebecca Behrendt was recently appointed the new Chiswick Area Co-ordinator by Hounslow Council to fill the vacancy left by her predecessor David Palmer. ChiswickW4.com met up with Rebecca to discuss her new role, community relations and her priorities for Chiswick.

With a background in Street Management, Rebecca has worked for Hounslow Council for the past nine years and describes her new role as being “a link between the community, elected councilors, and Council services.” And, after hearing her views and witnessing her dedication to the job, there is little doubt that her enthusiasm for “establishing good lines of communication with members of the community” is genuine.

She said “It’s my job to resolve issues at service level, making sure they do not get lost in the system. But I also need to ensure that members of the community and their elected councillors are realistic about the Council’s priorities, finances and with their own expectations.”

Rebecca would also like to encourage more residents to attend the Chiswick Area Monitoring and Planning Committee Meetings. “These committees need to hear positive suggestions and receive constructive input from the community, not just objections.”

As part of the Council’s Community Plan, Chiswick’s Top Five Priorities (to be published imminently) also come under her jurisdiction. In her opinion, one such priority is “street-clutter”.

She says, “After numerous calls from residents complaining about a-boards on both Turnham Green Terrace and Devonshire Road, we sent out enforcement officers to take a look. After taking into account the health and safety factors and manpower resources, we decided upon a zero tolerance approach in these two areas which proved successful, so we rolled it out across the whole of Chiswick.”

She continued, “We’ve still got a long way to go, but we are working on to make Chiswick a brighter place.”