A PUBLIC meeting called to garner support for a traditional fountain for Ilkley resulted in overwhelming support for the existing contemporary design.

Meeting organiser Roger Yaxley branded the dissenters against his proposals “a vindictive mob”, then took to Tesco to stage his own vote.

Local charity Improving Ilkley is pushing ahead with a modern fountain design for the junction of The Grove and Brook Street, chosen from a shortlist of entries drawn up and following a public consultation.

But Mr Yaxley has been campaigning for a more traditional stone fountain design, and called a public meeting at the Clarke Foley Centre on Saturday.

Mr Yaxley feels the proposed fountain, designed by Juliet and Jamie Gutch and inspired by the sphagnum moss that creates Ilkley Moor’s famous peat, was not in keeping with the town and not chosen by democratic vote.

However, if he was expecting a wave of support for his idea at his meeting, things did not go his way.

David Shaw, who was the independent chair of the meeting, said the two-year process was outlined and Mr Yaxley and his supporters wanted a town-wide vote to take place on the final design of the fountain, with ballot boxes placed at various locations around Ilkley, including Tesco, Booths, the library, the Clarke Foley Centre and Robinson Harrison Estate agents.

Mr Shaw said: “Mr Yaxley was challenged heavily many times about why he couldn’t accept the democratic process to date, or why people should vote for his traditional fountain as he hadn’t any costings yet regarding important maintenance costs and water testing for his pump proposal or approval yet from Bradford Council. He admitted he did not have an actual full design for his stone fountain yet. The meeting questioned heavily why should we vote and what validity did this vote have by an individual, and as it was not fully monitored, like in council/government elections, how could they be assured of the results.

“It was pointed out heavily that Mr Yaxley’s campaign has been extremely detrimental to raising funds for the chosen design and this is extremely sad and caused much confusion and must stop to allow the process to continue.”

Including the organisers, there were 35 people at the meeting, and a show of hands was called to see which fountain design was favoured. Twenty-eight voted to stay with the contemporary design and seven, including the three proposers, for the traditional fountain. A vote also took place about whether there should actually be a town-wide vote on the fountain – again, 28 people agreed it should not happen.

Mr Yaxley told the Gazette: “We were appalled at the loud vindictive mob that was sent to support a modern fountain. After they calmed down, they then unbelievably asked for all attendees to vote on cancelling the fountain vote.”

Undeterred, Mr Yaxley went straight to Tesco with what he called “a large voting box” to get his fountain vote underway. At one point the security guards were called after a disagreement between Mr Yaxley and another man who had attended the meeting.

Following the meeting, Improving Ilkley said: “The meeting at the Clarke Foley called for by individuals who oppose the fountain plan, was attended by approximately 35 people. Improving Ilkley did not attend. It has come to our attention that following on from the vote, individuals that called the meeting then placed the ballot boxes in Tesco, whilst also in attendance, thus choosing to ignore the voting outcome.

“Now that the vote has taken place, with both results heavily in our favour, we hope that the negative backdrop created by a very small group of people can now be set aside, and look forward to delivering the fountain with the support of, and in ongoing consultation, the local community.

“We continue to move forward and fundraise; if anyone feels as if they can donate, this will help move us towards our fundraising goal. Additionally, we look forward to releasing a to scale model in the same materials, sometime in early spring, and completing the first phase of the project in 2024.”