Watford Borough Council Information

At Watford Borough Council, we are working hard to be an efficient, effective, value for money council. We have made over £12 million of efficiency savings over the last seven years.

The amount of council tax that residents pay to Watford Borough Council (17 pence in every pound) goes a long way. Here are some examples of the services we provide:

• We make 3.6 million visits a year to homes across Watford to collect rubbish, recycling and green waste.

• Last year we collected around 17,560 tonnes of domestic waste, more than 3,058 tonnes of paper, 1,791 tonnes of glass and around 692 tonnes of cans and plastic. 

• Annually, we clean 1600 tonnes of litter and leaves from Watford’s roads. 

• We provide 480 litter bins across Watford - which we emptied more than 90,000 times last year.

• Last year we removed 98 dumped cars from the borough.

• The Mayor’s Community Fund gives £50,000 of grants every year to support local community projects that clean, smarten and make safe the local environment.

• We provide and manage 40 playgrounds, 9 games areas and basketball courts, 2 skate parks and 2 supervised adventure play facilities.

• The Council manages 5 community centres and 2 cemeteries.

• We own and manage Cassiobury Park, Whippendell Woods, 13 allotment sites and 4 nature reserves.

• Last year the council decided 1412 planning applications and 137 requests for pre application advice.

• We issued approximately 5,500 residents’ parking permits in the last year at no additional cost to Council Tax payers.

• Last year we licensed 364 taxis and private hire vehicles.

• There have been more than a million visits to the council’s two new leisure centres in the first year of operation. 656,585 visits to Watford Leisure Centre - WOODSIDE and 417,310 visits to Watford Leisure Centre – CENTRAL.

• We maintain and empty 380 dog bins annually – collecting 1.5 tonnes of dog waste per week.

• We dealt with over 650 noise complaints last year.

• Over 1600 pest control visits were carried out last year.

• On average, every month more than 22,500 people visit the council’s website.

• Services such as schools; adult care and social services; highways; fire and rescue service; libraries and trading standards are the responsibility of Hertfordshire County Council.