Newport's new mayor proud of town's lockdown resilience
Newport's new mayor said it was an honour to be elected and she is proud of the town's success in coming out of lockdown.
Town councillor Lyn Fowler was elected mayor at a meeting last week – it is the second time she has been sworn in to the top role having served as mayor from 2016 to 2018.
This time around she said she hopes to continue supporting town businesses as the coronavirus lockdown eases up.
Mrs Fowler said: "I have lived in Newport 29 years after moving here from Manchester. My husband is a Novaportian.
"My children all went to school in Newport and have settled in the town after initially travelling far and wide, and now all my grandchildren are are attending those same schools and the youngest attends a local nursery.
"I have previously been mayor of Newport as well as being deputy mayor twice. It's an honour to have been asked by my fellow councillors to become mayor again.
"The deputy mayor this year is Ian Perry, and Ian and I will work in partnership to do our best for the town.
Choose Newport
"I work full time for British Gymnastics as their customer experience manager, usually based at Lilleshall but I have been working from home since March 2020 and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.
"The town council was very concerned during lockdown that Newport High Street came out of the pandemic as healthy as it went into it, so we created the Choose Newport campaign which has been a great success.
"We continue with our efforts to make Newport a destination of choice, encouraging people from far and wide to shop here and we are just creating our own calendar for 2022 with a photo competition to boost the campaign further. Hopefully the residents will buy a copy later in the year.
"The wonderful people from Newport In Bloom will soon be putting up their beautiful hanging baskets and the council will be raising the bunting in celebration of a return, to what we all hope will be normality.
"On the July 10 we are hoping the businesses in the town will turn their shops inside out, and display their wares outside their premises to encourage people inside. Next week councillors will be in the town asking people to sign up to this initiative."
