Sussex weekly round-up: 18 May - 24 May 2024
Crawley Town will play in football's third tier next season after their Wembley play-off final win
- Published
The story about Crawley Town being promoted to League One proved a popular read this week.
A variety of local issues featured on the BBC News website, BBC Radio Sussex and BBC South East Today.
We have picked five stories from the past week in case you missed them.
Water firm offers compensation after five-day outage
Bottled water stations were set up after thousands were left without water in East Sussex
Southern Water is to compensate businesses and community groups after thousands were left without water in East Sussex for five days.
The outage, which coincided with the May Day Bank Holiday weekend, affected 32,500 properties in Hastings and St Leonards.
At the time, East Sussex County Councillor Godfrey Daniel said it would have a “huge impact” at what was normally a busy time for hotels, pubs and restaurants, and as businesses struggled with the cost of living.
Southern Water’s director of water Tim McMahon said he hoped the £1m compensation fund would "make a positive difference".
Olympic champion joins protests over sewage spills
Olympic champion Dame Kelly Holmes joined protesters in Brighton
Dame Kelly Holmes joined demonstrators in Brighton at a protest calling for an end to sewage discharges.
Thousands of people took part in demonstrations at more than 30 beaches, rivers and lakes across England on Saturday.
Speaking at the Surfers Against Sewage protest on Brighton beach, the Olympic gold medal runner said she had paddle-boarded on the River Medway, which runs through Sussex and Kent, last weekend.
"But it was disgusting," she said. "The smell, the colour of it - I thought something’s not right.”
Council votes to bring back mayoral robes
The robes are to be brought back minus any fur trim
Councillors in West Sussex have voted to bring back mayoral robes less than a year after scrapping them.
They were dropped by Worthing Borough Council in July following claims their formality could deter people from engaging with local democracy, with some critics also unhappy the robes were trimmed with fur.
Opposition Conservative councillors said the last 10 months had been a “dark stain” on the town’s history and the lack of robes at Remembrance Day was an “insult” to local veterans.
The council will now look at bringing back a new set of robes that do not have animal fur.
BBC Radio Sussex heard from residents and councillors in the town.
Funeral for drag queen who died following illness
Jason Sutton, who performed on stage as Miss Jason, passed away on 22 April
A funeral has been held for a drag queen and pantomime dame.
Jason Sutton, who performed on stage as Miss Jason, passed away on 22 April following an illness.
A private service took place before a wake at Legends nightclub in Brighton, East Sussex, on Thursday.
Friends and former colleagues said Sutton was a joy on and off stage.
My life was split in two by infected blood scandal
Kiri was 18 when her dad died of hepatitis C
Kiri Nowak-Smith’s life is split into two halves. Her father’s death is the dividing line.
Peter Nowak, who was from West Sussex, died in 2005, just four months after his diagnosis of hepatitis C.
He was one of the 30,000 people who were exposed to hepatitis C and HIV after having blood transfusions in the 1970s, 80s and 90s.
A report of an inquiry, external into the infected blood scandal is due to be published on Monday.
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