Nik Butler: Can we change our district’s destiny in 2014?

Wrapping paper once carefully laid and taped has been shredded, mashed and stashed and now awaits the seasonally adjusted pickups. Horsham exists in that graceful state between years. Silently ticking down the days until it rolls over into 2014 and we begin the merry dance of Headlines, news and meetings. Many will make new promises to see in the new year; some will commit and some will quickly forget. What lies before us in Horsham is a year that will see steps of change in land development and business investment. The global economy which lies ever more on the shoulders of the Internet and mobile will ever move its investments out of property into ideas and data. Schools will churn out another collection of students suited for academic progress and university processing. Yet unsuited to modern communications and adaptive learning practices. Hopefully apprenticeships will begin to outstrip the belief that the only success is by Degree and with it the end to investing in educational loans. Council tax may be held down another year and with it the reality that the compounded interest in recovering the difference will be harder to payback than any payday loan. Services will be thinned, sliced, diluted or distressed and with it the ever insipid suggestion that freeloaders and immigrants are to blame for such a lack of monies in the pots today. No mention will be made as to why we were not slowly and thoughtfully increasing what we collected in taxes so as to stay ahead of the evident upward costs that were plain to see. Kickstarters, the genuine crowdsourced variety not the mislabelled grant varieties, may replace funding for many of the community activities as the crowd grows weary of waiting on the gatekeepers of taste to elect on what may entertain us that year. A village may get a name and a town may lose its borders and we will run desperately into 2015 in the hope of elections and the belief that we can outpace the overt racism and bigotry which wears democratic clothing. 2014 may seem a bleak opportunity; but I prefer to view it as the slate on which Horsham can decide to own its town or surrender to its investors.