BROMSGROVE would know before Christmas whether its bid to form a twinning link with Gronau in West Germany would be successful. A delegation from Gronau had just completed a whistlestop tour of Bromsgrove to judge its suitability. Bromsgrove had already agreed to the plan.

DEMAND for shelter for battered women had risen so dramatically that organisers of Bromsgrove's Gateway project had been forced to seek larger premises. Demand at the secret address was so great that some woman and their children were having to be turned away.

THE future for a prominent old building in the Strand in Bromsgrove looked bleak after Hereford and Worcester Preservation Trust turned down the opportunity to acquire it. The property, probably built at the time of Queen Anne, had been at times been a prison, a workhouse, and latterly a water company office. The district council, which owned it, said it would probably now be put on the open market.

BROMSGROVE had been earmarked to expand its population by 9,000 over the next two years and by a further 7,000 by 1991. The increase would be as a result of Birmingham overspill. By the start of 1990s the town's population would be in the region of 100,000.