Councillor wants plug pulled on noisy park parties

THE hip hop party at Bulwer Park on 27 December caused a massive outcry from some residents who posted a spate of complaints about the noise levels on social network platforms and approached ward councillor, Nicole Graham who said she would be requesting to council that similar parties not be allowed in the area again.

Cheryl Johnson from Save Our Berea said although it had been well run, she felt the city should have alerted residents living around the venue of their plan for the event.

“Of course there is no problem with trying to bring people together to try to understand or demystify each other’s culture, but why did the City not include the residents living around the venue? And who are they to ‘educate’ people without their buy-in? This is a democracy. The City operates like a dictatorship. Why did the City not inform Nicole so she could inform her constituents? She claims she knew nothing about it,” she said.

Graham said the event had been organised by the Arts and Recreation Department who had met with her at the beginning of December to explain what they wanted to do.

“Residents must understand that as a councillor I can’t give permission for things to happen in my ward, the municipality does that, sometimes we don’t even get informed of events. I attempted to put certain conditions in place such as that the party happen in the bottom of the park, that there was no alcohol, that there was security, that it be fenced off and that the noise ends at 10pm, however it was still very loud after 10pm. It was meant to be aimed at helping underpriviledged people, which I fully support, however it was very loud and I have requested this doesn’t happen again as many people did react very badly to it,” she said.