Say NO to selling off our land!
6 – 7 pm Wednesday the 23rd of July 2008
Hackney Council will have their full council meeting at 7pm on the
23rd of July, we will demonstrate from six outside. From 7pm we will
attend the meeting. Please come whenever you can!
Hackney Town Hall is on Mare St near Hackney Central overground station.
Hackney Council plans to raise money by selling land from the
borough's council estates: they call this Estates Plus. Right now
they have been trying to convince the residents of Frampton Park
estate (just off Mare st) that the sale of five sites on the estate
will lead to improvements and help with overcrowding. This includes
green space, play areas and garages used by the residents. The land
will be sold to housing associations, who will build and then sell and
rent the flats they build. Although there will be more low rent
housing, which is much needed, it will be achieved by cramming more
people into an overcrowded area.
Most of the residents don't want the development; they don't want to
lose their green space and play grounds, when there aren't enough
places for kids to play already. One of the proposed buildings will be
just yards from older peoples flats, on a piece of land kids use for
football. The pensioners living in the flats would like to see a
garden there, but instead they will have a multistory block towering
over them.
Meanwhile across Hackney the council has sold off land that was and
could be good alternative places for this social housing to be built.
On Dalston Lane for instance, a row of Georgian houses with shop
fronts were sold five years ago by the council to an off shore
developer. They are protected and so could not be developed unless
they were damaged and derelict. Since then the houses have been
damaged by a series of fires, and some have been demolished. Those
houses could be muti bedroom accommodation for Hackney's overcrowded
tenants and homeless families. Instead Hackney will let those
buildings rot till they are developed into luxury flats, while off the
main streets the council estates are over developed. This is making
low income people bear the brunt of the housing crisis, and taking
facilities away from those who need it most.
We need your support on 23/07/08! Residents of other estates be aware
that Hackney plans to use Estates Plus across the borough – help to
stop the scheme on Frampton Park before it gets to your estate.