A Word from Watto

From time to time, John Watson, President of the Preston Beach Progress Assoc., will put together a few words for the membership and it will be published here on the blog.  This is the first of what should be regular updates from Watto;

A Word From Watto - 2012

 General Background

As you are all probably aware after the recent Annual General meeting The Preston Beach Progress Association executive now consist of Fred Evely, Vice President, Marion Herkes, Secretary, Danny (Mac scrooge) Norton, Treasurer and myself as President. Judy Carroll is to be congratulated on her hard work for the Progress Association over the many years and deserves a well earned break from the presidency. However in saying this Judy is still prepared to support and assist the Progress as we continue to travel into the future.

 Welcome to Our New Members

Under Larraine’s initiative and Marion’s support Preston Beach Progress has commenced a new membership drive which is having outstanding results. If you know of others who have a vested interest in Preston Beach, either residential or transient to Preston on weekends, public holidays or when they please, can contact us for membership forms. The more membership the better, as we are all in this together.

Community Ownership Vision

In my other life before retirement there was a mindset syndrome called “The Broken Window Syndrome”. Also documented in enforcement research. In summary, it relates to damage, anti social behaviour, and crime. The syndrome starts from a small incident of a window in a street building being broken and left unrepaired. It then becomes a signal that there’s no ownership and no one really cares, so the breaking of more windows in that street occurs. This cascading affect is the same as a motor vehicle being left unattended on the side of the road for several days. Someone comes along and smashes in the front windscreen, if still left unattended the mind set signal comes to fruition – no one cares so the vehicle becomes totally trashed and sometimes burnt along with other vehicles in the vicinity. The area or neighbourhood then declines - people begin to ignore rowdy, unruly and threatening behaviour. They no longer become the eyes and ears by ceasing to exercise social regulation over little things happening in the area. When law-abiding eyes stop watching the streets, social order breaks down and a more vicious cycle begins. Pride, community ownership, law-abiding eyes and ears to enhance social regulation can eradicate this broken window syndrome.

To enable us to display a form of pride and community ownership, in liaison with the Shire of Waroona, there will be a placement of a Welcome to Preston Beach entry sign on the right hand side of the causeway as you enter Mitchell Road. More work is planned to develop this area into a viable entry statement with a new upgraded Information Town site map, a picnic rest area and seating. Our current Preston Beach Town site information map at this location is outdated with its support structure becoming unserviceable and unsafe. This will be addressed at our next Progress general meeting Saturday March 31^st, 2012.

Preston Beach Community Open Day

The Preston Beach Community open day for the Town Site Strategy project, took place between 10 am to 2 pm Saturday March 10^th 2012 and was well attended by community members. Approx 120 people attended our community centre to find out what was happening, asked questions and provided feedback. Appreciation is given to all who assisted and contributed in making this a successful occasion. Marie and her team, Larraine, Marion, Bev Judy, Jan, Fred, Lew, Geoff and Doug, your support and commitment was outstanding, so were the few wines and frothies’ later.

Thank You

On a personal note, I would like to thank you all for your kind thoughts and condolences on the passing of my son John Patrick Watson (Jnr). Your support was greatly appreciated by Larraine and myself.

Regards

John Watson

President Preston Beach

Progress Association

March 16^th 2012