Council news

Diss Town Council has been busy working on its remaining strategic plan objectives to create a greener, cleaner and safer town, develop and implement the Diss & District Neighbourhood Plan and reduce costs to deliver better value to residents.

We are looking forward to a great line up of events this Spring / Summer namely ‘A Right Royal Celebration’ in honour of the King’s Coronation on 7th May (see p6-7) and our ‘Diss goes to Hollywood’ inspired Carnival on June 11th (see p18-19). We are so grateful to the volunteers and partners with whom we work to make important events like this and other projects a reality.

Creating a greener, cleaner, and safer town

We have invested in more resources including an additional van, equipped with a water pump system to improve the efficiency of cleaning the town centre and watering its 50+ floral displays. Our new billy goat street vacuum has significantly increased the effectiveness of clearing litter and together with a staff restructure and revised work schedule, we are seeing increased productivity and longer-lasting results. We are considering different ways to manage our green spaces to encourage biodiversity. We have a plan to plant additional trees in Diss Park and are working with our higher tier authorities on site proposals for wildflower areas to complement the existing floral displays throughout the town. The Diss Litterpicking group has done a wonderful job of keeping public spaces tidy (see p22) and the Council’s support of the composter and community fridge projects contribute to the Council’s aims to act sustainably. We have also made 600kg in carbon and 2.22 tonnes of CO2 savings by dimming streetlights and switching off just over 50% of them in the early hours of the morning whilst continuing to ensure resident safety by retaining nightlighting on connecting footpaths and highways.

We are working with a designer to deliver a public realm art project in Diss, an idea that was overwhelmingly supported by the Diss community. This is an exciting initiative which fully engages residents in the design, will enhance the appearance of buildings in Diss, should help to draw more footfall into the town centre and will be fully funded by external grants at no cost to the taxpayer. Alongside this, the Town Council will be updating its information display boards across our sites including around the park and mere, installing phase two of the town’s beacon of hope partnership project to include six engraved panels, quartz paving and granite seating and undertaking works at Mere’s Mouth including replacing brickwork and repainting railings. Together with the installation of the EU-funded art installation, ‘Flock’, these measures will significantly improve the aesthetic appearance of a key vista in the town contributing to the Council’s vision to make Diss a successful, vibrant, attractive town where people want to live, work and visit.

Thank you to all town councillors, staff, volunteers and partners with whom we also work to make a difference to our town.

Diss

Protecting local green spaces is also at the heart of the Diss & District Neighbourhood Plan, which is in its final stages of examination prior to a public referendum expected post elections in May.

improve the appearance of other Council owned areas and by taking on the management of some of the planters using in-house expertise, we have further decreased expenditure. Together with a budget for 2023/24 that reflects a 0% increase compared to the current year (the Town Council element of the Council Tax bill accounts for approximately 10% of the total bill which also includes charges from South Norfolk Council, Norfolk County Council and Norfolk Police), we are continuing to assess additional measures to deliver even better value to our residents. These include reviewing existing contracts to identify cost savings and increasing revenue generated at our sites such as the Sports Ground & Diss Youth & Community Centre through additional bookings where capacity allows. We are also investigating options for increasing the footfall in the town centre through increased market activity and an expanded events programme, designed to pay for themselves with support from local business, volunteers, stallholders and community groups.

Reducing costs and delivering better value

Dimming and switching off streetlights has offset the expected increases in electricity costs. The staff time saved by our new street cleaning equipment will be invested to help

Sarah Villafuerte-Richards, Town Clerk at Diss Town Council