CALLINGTON’S newest councillor says she’s on a mission to make the town a more dog-friendly place – and she wants to help brighten prospects for families, youngsters, and local businesses. 

Penny Ward and her daughter Carly relocated to Cornwall during the first lockdown in August 2020. 

The pair had come from Buckinghamshire, where they’d run a successful business, training apprentices. 

Penny describes herself as a lifelong entrepreneur, and together with Carly, their current project is to establish an animal welfare charity that will support other small charities with their fundraising goals. 

With fresh eyes as a relative newcomer to Callington, Penny is keen to get involved in efforts to improve life and work in the town. 

“I’m particularly interested in the local business community and how we could ramp things up and make Callington a great place to live, a great place to start and run a business, and to start a family,” she says. 

“Being new to the town I can bring fresh ideas.” 

One project that Penny has already got her sights on is the provision of a dog-walking and exercise area, something she says the town centre currently lacks. 

“When I first moved to Callington I went outside and thought where could we go, and was greeted with a huge field, completely empty, with a sign saying no dogs allowed,” she says. 

The playing field she mentions is on the Launceston Road, where there’s children’s play equipment at the top, a Multi Use Games Area planned, and a further area of open space. 

“There’s a lot of complaints about dog mess, but a lot of that is because there’s nowhere for people to take their dogs and in the South Hill Road for example, there isn’t a dog poo bin. 

“I’m determined to make Callington more dog-friendly. At the moment people have to take their dog on a lead walk, or drive to somewhere in a car, or hire a field.” 

Carly had the idea to start a ‘Callington dog meet up’ group: it started in September 2022 and there are now around 200 members on Facebook. 

“We meet on Sundays at Kit Hill, there’s usually around 15 of us,” said Penny. 

“It’s gone down so well, and not just for the dogs, for the social side.”