High and Mighty ESG slammed by Civic Society

There's little doubt that the Edgar Street Grid organisation is not flavour of the month with Hereford United chairman Graham Turner. He has, in effect, suggested that they have included potential clients, who might have become tenants as and when the football ground is redeveloped, in their own plans leaving the football club struggling to find partners for space around the two ends of the Edgar Street ground.

This weekend another organisation, the Hereford Civic Society, has accused the ESG of failing to listen to others and has therefore decided to withdraw from the ESG stakeholder forum.

Their letter is addressed to Mike Ashton of the Chamber of Commerce:

ESG Stakeholder Forum

On behalf of the Hereford Civic Society, I am writing to you in my capacity as chairman, to request the removal of the HCS from the ESG stakeholder forum with immediate effect.

I should like you, the forum’s stated chairman, to understand the reasons why HCS no longer wishes to be involved:

•The forum is no longer widely representative
•Attendance continues to be very poor; often just ESG and Council Officers are present
•Those others that do attend have no control of meetings or agenda
•ESG officers do not record minutes or return with comments, evidence, or follow up
•Nothing changes as to project detail despite much discussion
•It is quite apparent that external group involvement is tokenism merely to give credibility to ESG statements as to widely conducted consultation about the project – when in fact no effective consultation is actually taking place
•The forum adds to confusion as to the project delivery phase and the project consultation phase
•Despite the significant gravity of this project, leaders of council and chief executive of the JVC routinely fail to turn up to meetings. They do not engage in consultation with the public, preferring the counsel of their own wisdom rather than that of the forum
•The role of the Chamber of Commerce remains unclear as to the Chambers own objectives
•The Civic Society cannot see where decision-making or the ESG project has changed as a result of attendance
•A request that the HCS should add subjects to meeting agendas, on distinctiveness, characterisation and wider linkages within the city as a whole, has been summarily dismissed

Given the above, I am sure you can understand the reasons why the HCS wishes to disengage from the ESG Stakeholder forum. In summary we believe it is not an effective tool for influencing a significant city project.

I trust that the above clarifies the position of the Civic Society and that the stakeholder forum makes no further reference to HCS involvement. We would request specifically that no further reference to HCS membership be made either in the forum's written material or on its web site. Please make this letter available at the next meeting of the Stakeholder Forum to record the formal withdrawal of our organisation.

Kind regards

Yours sincerely

Garry Thomas
Chair, HCS

For reference there were ten people at the last stakeholders forum meeting. Apologies were received from 15 people including the ESG chief executive. No one connected with Hereford United, or any other sporting organisation, appears to have attended any of the stakeholder meetings. Perhaps they were not invited despite the importance of the football club and its proximity to the ESG.

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