Cllr Louise Morales has been elected Mayor of Woking at the official Mayor Making ceremony held yesterday evening (Monday 20 May) in the Council Chamber. 

After a year as Woking’s Deputy Mayor, Louise is excited for the role, and “looking forward to celebrating cultural diversity and learning new things about the Woking community.”

Born in Bristol and moving to Woking in 1996, Louise has always been an avid gardener and botanist. She studied Botany at the University of Manchester and made her way to Woking via a job in a local plant nursery.

Woking Borough Council has successfully prosecuted Okra Lounge Ltd, located at Station Approach in West Byfleet, for endangering the lives of residents. 

On Monday 29 April 2024, Mr Ilhan Coban, one of the directors of Okra Lounge Ltd, pleaded guilty for breaching health and safety legislation at Guildford Magistrates’ Court.

Woking Borough Council is proud to support National Hoarding Awareness Week taking place from Monday 13 May to Friday 17 May.

Hoarding is a recognised mental health disorder, where someone acquires an excessive number of items and stores them in a chaotic manner, usually resulting in unmanageable amounts of clutter. The items can be of little or no monetary value.

Refurbishment work to the tennis courts is set to get underway at West Byfleet Recreation Ground, following partnership investment from the UK Government, Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) Tennis Foundation and Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) funding.

Two tennis courts will be renovated, with investment of over £117,000 helping ensure that quality facilities are available for the local community. 

Woking Borough Council has successfully prosecuted local resident Mr Nicholas Tiller of Paddocks Mead, Woking at Guildford Magistrates’ Court on Monday 22 April 2024 for fly-tipping household items on two separate occasions.

The first offence took place on 2 June 2023, when Mr Tiller visited the Parley Drive recycling banks in his van and was caught on CCTV dumping black sacks of household waste.

The second offence took place on 4 June 2023, when Mr Tiller was again caught on CCTV dumping more black sacks at the Parley Drive site.

From today (Tuesday 7 May 2024), calls to the council's main 01483 755 855 number will only be answered by Customer Services between the hours of 9am and 1pm, Monday to Friday (instead of between 9am and 5pm).

The change only affects calls to our main Customer Services number. The automated telephone options will still be available all day and there is no change to direct dial/extension numbers.

Due to a system error, rent and service charge Direct Debit payments due on Wednesday 1 May 2024 were inadvertently collected today (Friday 26 April 2024). We would like to apologise for any hardship or distress this error may have caused. 

You are advised to speak to your bank or building society to request a refund for the amount under the Direct Debit Guarantee which protects customers against payments taken in error. Refunds will be made the same day. 

With only two weeks to go, borough residents are being urged to get ‘vote ready’ ahead of the upcoming local council and Police and Crime Commissioner for Surrey elections on Thursday 2 May 2024.

Local elections give residents the opportunity to vote for borough councillors who decide on services at a local level, such as planning, housing, parks and green spaces, leisure services, recycling and waste collections and more.

Richard Carr has begun his new role as Woking Borough Council’s Chief Executive (Tuesday 2 April 2024).

Appointed Managing Director Commissioner by the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Homes and Communities in December 2023, Richard fulfils the role of Chief Executive following Julie Fisher’s decision to step down.

A landowner and their contractor have been prosecuted and fined over £18,000 for the unauthorised felling of more than 100 protected trees on land adjacent to Upshot Lane, Pyrford, by a judge at Guildford Magistrates’ Court.

During an initial hearing in October 2023, Burhill Development Ltd, who owns the land at Upshot Lane, pleaded guilty to the unauthorised felling of more than 100 trees protected by Tree Preservation Orders (TPO), as well as causing damage to a further seven protected trees.

On Friday 19 January 2024, we issued a statement in relation to the publication of Part 2 documents dating back to 2016 and provided an update from our auditor, Grant Thornton UK LLP, in relation to the independent Value for Money review we had asked them to undertake.

The independent Value for Money review considers our previous governance arrangements and processes for making effective decisions in relation to past investments, how risks were assessed and managed; and how these decisions were scrutinised.

We will be implementing the following service changes from 1 April 2024.