|
|
On Friday evening the City Council held the first of its public consultation meetings on the proposed land for leisure deal with Firoz Kassam. The meeting took place at Blackbird Leys Leisure Centre with approximately 250 attendees. John Tanner, Leader of Oxford City Council, opened the meeting with a short summary of the proposal and an explanation of why the council supports the deal. He then took comments and questions from the floor which he answered directly or passed on to John Arnold, Head of Property & Leisure at Oxford City Council.
The club was well supported by local residents and FOUL members who put forward their arguments as to why the deal should go ahead. Most people focussed understandably on the need to save the football club but also highlighted the very real requirement for modern leisure facilities such as a multiplex cinema. A number of local residents who live close to the development expressed their opposition and concerns. Most of these were answered and centred around parking problems on match days, the reinstatement of the children's play area and BMX track and blocking vehicle access from Littlemore to Minchery Farm. All of which John Tanner explained were addressed in the planning process.
At the end of the meeting a vote was taken by a show of hands. Firstly amongst the residents of the local area only. This vote was very much in favour of the development with approximately a 5 to 1 majority. Amongst those from other areas the vote was predictably almost totally in favour.
Firoz Kassam attended the meeting along with Nick Harris and Geoff Coppock from the club's board.
Monday was the day of the long awaited full meeting of Oxford City Council and turned out to have some positive news but also deferred a final decision on the proposed deal to a later date.
FOUL were given the opportunity to petition the council for 5 minutes before the meeting. We explained how without a new stadium Oxford United would almost certainly die and the current deal proposed by Firoz Kassam and the council's own Strategy and Resources Committee was the only way that this could happen. We highlighted the many reasons why a football club was an important part of the local community and why the council had a responsibility to help keep the club alive.
We finished by thanking the council for their enlightened and positive attitude to the club over the last few weeks and urged them to support the proposal.
Cllr. John Tanner announced the results of the telephone survey of 600 residents from across the city which had an 80% majority in favour of the proposed deal. Only 6% were against the deal with the remainder not having any opinion. Initially it had been intended that this meeting would vote on the proposal to (hopefully) give the council's final seal of approval. However because some councillors (Tony Stockford in particular) were concerned about making a decision before the public onsultation exercise was complete it was agreed to hold off taking a vote on the decision until after the second public meeting at Littlemore (tonight - Tuesday 20th April). John Tanner said that either a special meeting of the council would be called for this or it would be debated and voted on at the next scheduled full council meeting. The implication was that this would depend on an indication from Firoz Kassam that he was ready to sign up to the deal.
FOUL has carried out its own survey of residents around the stadium development in Greater Leys, Blackbird Leys and Littlemore. The full results will be available soon and will be published in a full report which will be made available to all interested parties and the local press. However the initial results show a large majority of local residents in favour of the scheme. Even amongst those not describing themselves as Oxford United supporters 86% were in favour from the first days results. This first section of the survey was carried out in the Greater Leys estate which is the closest to the stadium site.
