Romford Today is an independent news and information site for Romford and the London Borough of Havering. Our aim is straightforward: report what is actually changing here, from the record rather than from rumour, and make the everyday local information easy to find.
Our patch
Romford is the hub, and we cover the borough around it: Hornchurch and Emerson Park, Upminster and Cranham, Elm Park, Gidea Park, Collier Row, Harold Wood, Harold Hill, Havering-atte-Bower and Rainham and Wennington down by the Thames. It is a borough of owner-occupiers, green belt and railway lines, and a lot of what people search for here is practical rather than dramatic, which suits us.
What “from the record” means
Most of what we publish begins in a document that anybody may read and hardly anybody does: planning applications and decisions from Havering Council, licensing notices, committee papers, police.uk crime data, sold prices from HM Land Registry, Food Standards Agency hygiene ratings, Environment Agency flood warnings for the Ingrebourne, the Rom and the Beam, and company filings in The Gazette. We turn those into plain-English stories and we link to the original on every one. If a record does not say something, we do not say it either.
How the site is made
We use software to help us monitor those sources and draft routine updates quickly, which is how a small independent site can keep up with a borough of 280,000 people. The facts always come from the named source, never from invention, and anything sensitive is read by a person before it is published.
Corrections and tips
We would rather be accurate than first. If you spot an error, email hello@romfordtoday.co.uk and we will put it right and note the correction. The same address takes tips: a planning row, a road closure, a business opening or closing, or an event worth listing. We read everything and we treat tips in confidence.
Romford Today is part of the GOB Media Group. We are independent of the council and of everyone else we cover.