William Perrin

I am a community activist in Kings Cross, London and in my spare time work with residents to clean up our neighbourhood. This site is about the challenges we face locally and how we tackle them.

I have lived in London's Kings Cross on and off since 1995 (Wharfdale Road, Cally Road in the one-way, Rufford Street) I got heavily involved in improving the local environment when a car stuffed full of fireworks exploded outside my flat in Autumn 2002.

At that time the area around Rufford Street was in chaos - littered with burned-out cars, the streets piled high with rubbish, endemic anti-social behaviour, drug-addicted sex workers everywhere.

The community has pulled together since then and turned the area around working with the council, the police and the voluntary sector. I am also a non-executive board member of CYP the excellent local youth charity.

I recently took a sabbatical from my civil service job to set up www.talkaboutlocal.org to spread the benefits of grass roots community websites more widely.

I moved about a mile from Kings Cross recently but still keep up the website with the team and local activism.