My Beartown goes to Westminster.

When the government wants to learn what makes a successful local community initiative, where do they turn? To Congleton Beartown of course!

Margaret Williamson, Dawn Gibbins and Peter Aston were invited to the Houses of Parliament to describe some of the fantastic things our local community has done, and how we achieved it.

“Just think what we have accomplished over the last couple of years,” says Dawn...

• One of our founding activities was an Atmospheric Survey that made far-reaching recommendations to improve the local environment and has catalysed so much change
• The ‘My Beartown’ branding of to give all the activities focus
• The Bear Story schools competition, precursor to the Cultural Arts Festival
• Bear Mania complete with giant bears. involved over 3,000 local schoolchildren, local artists and local business. Bear Mania has already delivered thousands of visitors to the town and has enjoyed media coverage on BBC TV, Granada TV, national and local radio.
• Congleton Sustainability Group formed and active with initiatives such as Congleton's own apple juice
• Bears Mean Business expo with a real focus on encouraging inward investment and developing existing businesses.
• Our own MyBeartown website that has become an important resource used by the people of Congleton – it has achieved over 8,000 visitors last month, making more than 40,000 page views between them - all from a town with a population of 26,000.

The team also described some of our plans for next year, including a Beartown Outdoor Living Festival in May , a Bear Parade July, and the birth of Bosley Bear and the Professor, educational material that will be available across the UK.