GROUPS and schools across Wharfedale and Aireborough are celebrating receiving funding boosts for community and safety improvement projects.

The North West (Outer) Area Committee agreed to partially fund nine schemes which should improve the lives of people in Bramhope, Otley, Horsforth, Guiseley, Rawdon and Pool-in-Wharfedale.

The Well Being Projects include the rebuilding of a shelter (destroyed by arson) in Golden Acre Park, the creation of a safer footpath for primary school pupils in Rawdon, and a floral decorations scheme for Guiseley.

But the biggest initiative for this area, requiring an area committee contribution of £6,500, was for a mobile youth facility which will be shared across all the wards - Otley and Yeadon, Adel and Wharfedale, Guiseley and Rawdon and Horsforth.

It will involve a modified bus travelling around the different communities to provide a range of services, ranging from a mobile youth club to computer or health awareness workshops.

Although supported in principle by the committee, which met in Pool on Monday, Councillor Clive Fox (Con, Adel and Wharfedale) asked if more information could be provided.

He said: "I'm a bit cautious about allocating money of this sort without there being any more details about it, for example when it will go where and how many hours a week each area gets.

"Could we defer this?"

The committee heard that a detailed schedule for the youth bus would soon be available and decided to agree to fund it subject to seeing those details.

The Well Being grants agreed were:

l £4,280 towards the cost of replacing a shelter, destroyed by arson, in Golden Acre Park

l £3,333 to pay for story-based Children's Festival weekends at Otley and Horsforth libraries

l £2,000 to provide floral decorations, including 14 hanging baskets, three hay racks and 13 planters, on the streets and public buildings of Guiseley

l £4,291 to create a safer surfaced path, bypassing the car park where the current route goes, at Rawdon St Peter's C of E Primary School

l £3,775 for the resurfacing of 350 square metres of the Peasehills footpath

l £680 to replace old wooden gates with iron ones at Westbrook Lane Primary School

l £6,500 to provide a mobile youth facility for a year across the area.

Coun John Bale (Con, Guiseley and Rawdon), meanwhile, asked if the committee would also consider helping the Yorkshire Air Ambulance with a particularly pressing problem.

Coun Bale said: "There's a dispatcher at Yeadon looking at the three ambulance service areas on screens and he dispatches the helicopter based on his assessment of need.

"But once he's dispatched the helicopter he does not have any direct communication with it in the air, although it can talk to the ambulance service on the ground. But the dispatcher can't recall or redirect the helicopter.

"They need a satellite communication system to do that which costs around £25,000. They're fund-raising for that and it seems to me it's something we should support."

Coun Les Carter, however, questioned if the group should be funding a charity which served the whole region.

But Coun Ryk Downes supported Coun Bale's idea.

"The air ambulance is in our ward," he said, "and quite often I get asked for money from my ward for services in other parts of Leeds.

"Even a token amount would be right and proper for us as an area committee to make because they're based in our area."

l The committee also agreed to make the following £500 small grants:

l For Girl Guiding in Horsforth

l For an extended schools event being held in Otley, but also intended to benefit pupils from surrounding areas like Pool and Bramhope

l For Otley in Bloom's Gateways project

l For Otley Carnival.