VILLAGERS in Congresbury are being urged to put pen to paper in a bid to save their community building from potential closure.

VILLAGERS in Congresbury are being urged to put pen to paper in a bid to save their community building from potential closure.

Last week North Somerset Council's Tory leader, Nigel Ashton, announced that as part of the budget process the unitary authority could be looking at cutting rural library services.

So Congresbury parish councillor, Peter Sewell, is sending letters to residents to ask them to write to North Somerset Council's chief executive Graham Turner to urge him to help save their facility.

In his letter Cllr Sewell says:

* The location of the library makes it ideally suited for use by local primary school children and their parents.

* Its proximity to the medical centre allows older, less able people to combine visits to both.

* Closure of the library would force those who now walk to school, medical centre, or community hall to use cars to go out of the village just for a visit to the nearest one at Yatton.

* Those who do not have access to a car would be further isolated and denied the support the library provides.

At a budget briefing last week the Weston & Somerset Mercury asked Cllr Nigel Ashton and the authority's director of finance, Phil Hall, about the future of the area's libraries.

Cllr Ashton said: "They all cost money to run. This is not a scare story. We should review the libraries." Further decisions on cuts are expected by the end of the year.