Your street needs you! Debbi’s story

15 July 2015

Written by: Campaigns team

News and announcements

Our street champion Debbi tells us how she is trying to make a difference in her street, through becoming a street champion and organising a community freshview.

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Your street needs you! Debbi’s story

Your street needs you!

If you live in Lambeth and want to improve your street and get to know your neighbours, why not become a Street Champion? We’re building on our existing community networks, such as Community Freshviews and Snow Wardens, to give a broader range of opportunities to get people involved in their neighbourhoods. Being a Street Champion means you receive support from us for all sorts of activities, from tackling issues such as litter and dog fouling, to organising street parties.

Debbi is one of many who have already signed up.

Here’s Debbi’s story:

A couple of years ago I signed up to be a Lambeth Snow Warden as I wanted to get outdoors and do something useful for my street. There has been barely a flake of snow since. When I found out about the Street Champions project I thought it might provide the opportunity I wanted, without having to rely on the notoriously fickle British weather.

I believe it’s important to put something back into society and so, on a very small level, helping to improve the look of the street where I live seemed ideal. Encouraging neighbours to put their bins away after collection day or picking up the odd bit of litter is a small price to pay to be able to make a difference to my immediate environment. I know the council sends street cleaners here, and litter-picking might not be for everyone, but for me it seems like an obvious way to help keep the street clean. Perhaps the litterers will see me out with my litter-picker, and be shamed into changing their ways. It’s worth a try.

The council provided me with a litter-picker and some bags. I imagine keeping my street clean is almost as much fun as shovelling snow, although I don’t know for sure because, as I said, we haven’t had any snow! We’ve also had our first Community Freshview event. We clipped a few hedges and had a general tidy up; it was fun and sociable and I met a few more of my neighbours.

Find out more information

For more information on how you can get involved: