The item published last month about Cuckmere Estuary (The Argus, September 18) reported that East Sussex County Council wants people to contribute to decision-making about the estuary’s future, now that £250,000 has been awarded to the council by the Department of Environment (DEFRA) to fund its Pathfinder Project.

In fact this money was awarded in 2009 and the project now has only a few months until completion. As local residents with long-standing interest in the estuary, we were invited by the council in November 2009 to help establish and run the Cuckmere Estuary Community Forum.

We joined with hopes that the local community might at last be allowed an influential role in decisions about the future of the wonderful Cuckmere Estuary. But after giving much commitment and time to the new organisation, we have now resigned.

The Pathfinder Project was only revealed to us once we had agreed to join the Forum. Its plan of work had been pre-decided with DEFRA and displaced our own. The community’s opportunity to research and report on the various possible futures for the estuary was sharply curtailed.

Cuckmere Estuary faces long-term challenges, from climate-change and potential sea-level rise. In 2007, the council decided on an experimental scheme of Managed Realignment in which the estuary’s meanders would eventually disappear.

But there are other less radical options which we suggested should be researched. At first the council seemed to see merit in this, but then wrote insisting its policy was not going to change. We question whether £250,000 of public money should be spent on an engagement project where the policy has been decided.

We are reluctant to dissuade readers from joining in what remains of this project, because the views of local people should be at the centre of decision-making. But those who do think of participating should be sure they understand what “community engagement” really means.

Dr Jill Rosser and Tristram Hodgkinson
Litlington, East Sussex