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Community participation - The Jaywick Community Assessment: Towards Regeneration in Tendring, EssexEdited by Thérèse Quinlivan, Rachel Hine and Jules Pretty The Guinness Trust and Centre for Environment and Society University of Essex - October 1999 Executive SummaryJaywick is a small seaside community on the Essex coast that has been characterised by decades of under-investment and social exclusion. Despite significant advances in thinking amongst external agencies from a variety of sectors in recent years, it remains a community with very poor housing stock and transport infrastructure, weak services, few amenities, high unemployment, and above average ill-health. Deep distrust of external agencies persists. Many serious issues need to be addressed in Jaywick. In the mid-1990s, a partnership was formed between statutory, voluntary and private agencies so as to put together bids for government money in various schemes. Public interaction, though, has tended to date to be consultative at best. As part of the Neighbourhood Renewal Assessment, it was decided that a participatory Community Assessment would be conducted in mid-1999. The Community Assessment was formulated specifically for the Brooklands and Grasslands area to take into account the lack of confidence amongst local people about being involved in an externally-driven activity. The aims of the Community Assessment were to collect information, involve as wide a range of local and professional stakeholders, increase the involvement and motivation of local people, and build the capacity of community development workers and other professionals to use participatory methods. The Community Assessment was conducted over 10 days in June 1999, after some 6-9 months of planning. The participatory appraisal process for Jaywick was designed to fit the particular local circumstances. It did not depend on people solely coming together at special events or meetings. Instead, small teams of 4-5 people went out to existing groups and individuals in the community. There was a strong emphasis on visualisations to encourage interaction, involving the use of participants’ data sheets, map-models, time-lines, seasonal calendars, social audits, mobility maps and transect walks. A variety of sampling approaches were used in the Jaywick Community Assessment to ensure that as large as possible sample of the population were involved, and that this group was representative of the whole population. These included drop-in sessions, meetings with community groups at their normal place and time, pre-arranged locations for chance encounters, transect walks, and a formal questionnaire. Some 270 local residents were actively involved in parts of the process, including some as team members. Despite contrary external perceptions, the majority of people participating in the Community Assessment consistently identified the strong community spirit as being a vital, and indeed unique, part of Jaywick life. Local people see the community as full of friendly people being good neighbours, looking after one another and creating a `lovely atmosphere’. Many spoke of the quiet, calm nature of the community, with open spaces and friendly people. It is important to note that these views present a counter to many of the external perceptions that non-local people have of Jaywick. Local people are proud of their place and their community, and would like to see these values maintained during and after any development of Jaywick. Clearly Jaywick is poor in physical capital (roads, housing stock), but rich in social and natural capital. The Community Assessment identified 65 distinct problems in Jaywick and a further 85 opportunities for improvement. These were grouped into 10 key areas:
A range of recommendations for each of these has been identified, giving a rich picture of life and opportunities in Jaywick. The immediate priorities are improvements to roads, street lighting, and housing conditions, removal of abandoned cars and rubbish, and development of improved leisure facilities, particularly for children. This report illustrates how participatory approaches can be effectively used to address social exclusion, and how these can lead to new and agreed priorities for community regeneration.
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