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Council magazines to be replaced across Buckinghamshire

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Published Date:
09 February 2010
Council magazines are to be scrapped in order to make way for one carrying county-wide and local stories.
The new pamphlets, yet to be named, is yet to be named but those organising it believe it will save about £110,000.

Each council will have their own publication with news and information from both distrct and Bucks County Council.

The bulk of the savings will be made in the distribution costs.

Carole Wright, senior communications and marketing officer at Aylesbury Vale District Council, said: "It's going to be an integrated magazine.

"What we will do is build a framework of county council stories up across the board and we will work on the district stories around those.

"That way we can make the text work together so that if there's an article about waste disposal on one page we can put waste collection information on the same page."

Currently the five magazines that serve Bucks cost £338,553 for the year and the budget for the new magazines will be £230,000.

Magazine budget for 2009/10

  • AVDC's District Link = £36,500

  • Chiltern Chronicle = £55,000*

  • South Bucks Report = £56,053

  • Wycombe's Community Voice = £63,000**

  • Buckinghamshire Times (BCC) = £168,000***


That cost could come down depending on how much money is gained through advertising.

Bill Chapple, deputy leader at Bucks County Council, said: "The next Buckinghamshire Times that will be going out will be the last Buckinghamshire Times that will be printed.

"It's been 10 years that it's been going out and it's served us well.

"I know it's been contentious sometimes, but at the end of the day if people don't know what we are doing they will assume we are doing nothing and that's not something that we want."

Recently Cllr Chapple claimed that 45 per cent of people prefer the county's magazine, Buckinghamshire Times, to local newspapers.

However, upon investigation the figure was actually the number of people that prefer it being delivered to their home.

In a survey on the Bucks Herald's website 48 per cent of people said they would rather get council information from the Bucks Herald while just two per cent chose Buckinghamshire Times.

District Link got five per cent of the vote with 33 per cent preferring the internet and 12 per cent not interested in council news.

*This is the amount allocated in the budget but it is expected to cost £35,250 by the end of the year.

**£11,000 of that will come from advertising

***£10,000 of advertising from external sources

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  • Last Updated: 09 February 2010 1:53 PM
  • Source: n/a
  • Location: Aylesbury
 
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1

JR,

09/02/2010 12:43:33
And I so looked forward to getting my copy of the glossy brochure.

Currently wasting over £330k but expecting to cut this to £230k.
On this occasion I will waive my consultancy fee & suggest how this can be cut from £230k to £0.

Why not simply send the stories to the Bucks Herald and sister publications? Leave it to the professionals.

"Recently Cllr Chapple claimed that 45 per cent of people prefer the county's magazine, Buckinghamshire Times, to local newspapers.

However, upon investigation the figure was actually the number of people that prefer it being delivered to their home."
Says it all really
2

BarryBob,

09/02/2010 14:06:39
I agree with JR, scrap the brochure altogether saving money for more important things, they keeep telling us they are desperate to save money.
3

Concerned Watermead Resident ,

Aylesbury 09/02/2010 20:40:36
Think of the green issue as well how many people actually just throw the publication in the paper recyle bin.
I agree with the others just drop the publication.
Got an idea the money saved can be used to pay for more grit and salt for this year and 2011
4

jabbawockee,

Aylesbury 09/02/2010 21:28:39
"I know it's been contentious sometimes, but at the end of the day if people don't know what we are doing they will assume we are doing nothing and that's not something that we want."

Would we really think that Bill?
5

Ordinary Chap,

11/02/2010 00:48:08
I agree with the above posts, save all the money by scrapping the blighted things altogether. In these difficult times there must be many better things to spend this money on. If the councils feel that they have to justify their existance by producing all this information, sent to the local papers and put it on the councils web-sites.

It would be interesting to know how many copies just go straight in the bin for re-cycling, mine certainly does most times. Also I seem to get it delivered most often on a sunday, please tell me that this doesn't cost "overtime rates" ?
6

JR,

11/02/2010 12:37:03
My copy generally arrives halfway into the first month of issue - so we get to miss many of the events listed on the inside back page.
All the info in these mags, when diluted to a weekly newspaper would take up less than a quarter of a page.
It is interesting to note that BCC spends thousands on producing glossy material to tell the world what a wonderful job they are doing - when the guy at the coal face can tell you exactly how bad things are. The swan has always been an apt logo for BCC. On the surface everything's calm and serene whilst underneath, the feet are going fifty to the dozen in an effort to stay from being swept downstream.
And looking at it another way, over 80% of the thing sits above water doing very little work & lookiong all showy whilst the other 20% is below the surface working 100% of the time.
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