To celebrate the official opening of the new drinking fountain at the town’s skatepark, Monmouth Off Street Project (MOSP) held a ’Skatejam’ at the park on Sunday, 25 September.

The event saw over 80 young people take part on a very sunny day with others and families and friends supporting the event.The idea of a water station came about when Community Support Officer (CSO) ’Joe’ Facchiano from Gwent Police realised that the kids and young adults were getting dehydrated after riding their skateboards and scooters and were turning to the local shop for fizzy drinks in single-use plastic bottles.Welcoming everyone to the skatejam, CSO Joe, one of the founder members of MOSP, said that following the opening of the skatepark and pumptrack in 2015, they have achieved all of their aims of providing a free leisure facility open to all cultures, uniting not just the young and mature age but also members of the community that are vulnerable or who struggle through circumstances beyond their control."The park" he said, "although it’s seen some very minor issues, has achieved and reached far beyond all expectations". "Before we officially open this fountain, I would like to express thanks on behalf of the young members of MOSP here today to the following organisations: Lottery Community Fund, Rockfield Estate Community Fund, and in particular Terry Christopher, Waitrose Community Fund, Welsh Church Fund, the Provincial Monmouth Freemasons, Bill Parnell for his expertise and logistics of quantity surveying, without which we would never have had this fountain nor the skatepark here today".Others he mentioned included Elliot Pardington, BWC construction, Aaron Hunter and Nigel Morris who offered to come and clean the fountain, Monmouth Fountains group, in particular Roger, Norman and Terry. Monmouth town and county councils, in particular Mike Moran, Ty Price for the use of their hall for their meetings and many others who have assisted them. Grim from Freestyle Skateboarding Newport provided all the prizes for the ’Jam’, Russ Heideman organised the prizes and acted as MC, Nicki Chappell, Tom Seaton, Lauren Waycock who designed the t-shirts, James Whittaker for the posters, Oscar and Thomas for the music, Sally from Chillipeppers for the banners and signs and "all the lads from Monmouth Off Street project".He thanked all the committee members of the off street project and said a special thanks to Shirley Hughes, chairperson of MOSP for all the hard work she puts into this programme, giving her a small token to help brighten up her Christmas.New permanent signage was unveiled, which shows who has donated either finance, or their services in kind towards the Fountain Project, and the development of the skatepark over the last six years.