Haverfordwest community garden funds request rejected

In March, Haverfordwest Town Council won £50,000 Heritage Lottery funding to build a community garden on land between Freemans Way and Cambrian Place where an electricity sub-station used to stand.

As part of the grant requirements the funds have to be spent by March 2023.

The council moved one step towards this at a full meeting on October 29 by granting £500 petty cash to the team tasked with getting the garden off the ground.

However, in what is another stumbling block for the project, the council could not come to an agreement on whether funds should be released for railway sleepers to be purchased, with many of the councillors unclear how many sleepers were actually needed.

Deputy mayor Jill Owens described the requests coming in as ‘pie in the sky’, while representative of Priory, Mr Martin Lewis said due to the group’s track record buying items the council should reject the request for sleepers.

• Town's £50,000 garden project could be lost after proposals rejected

Councillor Arthur Brooker, of Portfield, put forward a motion to let the group buy 100 sleepers so that materials could at least start to be transported to the site – as of yet the piece of land suggested for the garden remains untouched.

Councillor Johnathan Twigg, of Garth, then jumped in with an amendment to Cllr Brooker’s motion pushing the problem further down the line to a meeting in two weeks – Cllr Twigg had referred to the situation as a ‘debacle’.

Council voted in favour of Cllr Twigg’s amendment but not before the deputy mayor was scathing over how she felt the project had been handled.

“There seems to be a lot of time wasted round these roundabout arguments,” said Cllr Owens. “Someone has to grab this, kick it up the backside and get it going.”

Deputy mayor Jill Owens was scathing about how the project is going in a recent full council meeting (Image: Western Telegraph)

Haverfordwest Town Council has won a grant of £50,000 to build a community garden in the town

Councillor Moses, tasked with bringing to council reports on meetings with the garden task and finish group, asked for trust saying the project is threatening to become something of an embarrassment.

“There is a risk in terms of integrity, public perception of the council, and lottery funding in the future,” said Cllr Moses.

“It (the garden) has great potential, but until there is something to do we cannot get people excited. 

“The fundamental thing to do is get materials onto site and get it off the ground. We need a bit of trust.”

The council will hold an extraordinary meeting about the garden project at the Old Woollen Market on Quay Street next Wednesday, October 12.