Orbit East helps youngsters to spray away anti-social behaviour
24 August 2009
A group of young people from Suffolk have spray painted a mural to brighten a subway and tackle antisocial behaviour, with help from housing association Orbit East.
Orbit East manages homes on Barker Road, which back onto the pedestrian subway leading from Tesco to Richard Burn Way under the A134 in Sudbury.
As a hot spot for antisocial behaviour, the subway was intimidating for local residents walking through, so Babergh Community Safety Partnership came up with the idea of creating a mural.
Orbit East bid for and won £1,000 from the Orbit Group’s Community Investment fund to put towards the project. The Community Investment fund gives cash to groups, schools and associations, which want to improve the communities where Orbit manages homes.
The project was co-ordinated by Babergh District Council and included representatives from Suffolk County Council, Sudbury Town Council, the police, Suffolk Youth Offending Team, Connexions, Narcotics Anonymous and Tesco.
A community workshop was held earlier in the year where Scott Irving, Youth Worker and Spray Can artist from Brave Arts, worked with hundreds of local school students and local residents to come up with the designs along the theme of ‘scenes from Sudbury – old and new’.
Scott worked with the 70 children and teenagers to create the colourful and striking images over five days, and now the mural has been coated with anti-graffiti paint so the images cannot be damaged.
Orbit East Neighbourhood Manager Adele Kerr said: “This is a great example of how Orbit East is building brighter communities – literally! These designs certainly have the wow factor and we were pleased to be able to contribute to this project which will make a big difference to not only our tenants but to everyone in the area.”
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