Minutes of the meeting held on Thursday 8 December 2011.
Present: Mrs J. Swan (Chair), Mrs D. Saunders, Mrs S. Hosegood, Mr D. Drabble, Mr R. Yandle, Mr G Day, District Councillor Mr S. Dowding.
Apologies: County Councillor Mr A. Trollope-Bellew.
Declarations of interest in respect of any item on the Agenda: None were declared.
Public Input: No requests from the public.
The minutes of the meeting held on 8 September were approved and signed as a correct record with one addition in that the Council had discussed the problem of parked cars on Tower Hill.
Matters arising:
194. Devolution and Delegation of Services: It was felt that the Council could arrange to pay for the cutting of the grass verge in Croft Meadow. Enquiries to be made re responsibility of clearing the ditch/outlet in the orchard. The District Council clears out the grille at Sampford House.
Road sweeping at present being monitored.
195. Manor Farm Road: Clerk had received an email from Mr Owen, Highways, who had visited the site and felt nothing need be done at the moment. The Council disagrees and Mr Day was asked to look at the problem and perhaps arrange a working party.
196. Parking on Tower Hill: District Councillor to arrange a meeting with Police, Highways, Williton PC and other village users.
197. A record would be kept of Councillor's attendance at other meetings and training events.
198. County Council Matters: None discussed as County Councillor not present.
District Council Matters:
199. Road sweepers are monitored. Council asked to be made aware when the road is being swept so that vehicles could be moved.
200. Uncollected rubbish from Sampford Mill to be investigated.
201. Toilet closures. Still undecided but possibility of closing one toilet if there are two in the same area.
202. Supermarket in Williton. Plans due to be submitted in early January.
203. Williton Hospital. Council has been asked to support the campaign against the cproposed ward closure.
204. The hoax GATSO camera. District Councillor is to chase up Planning Dept.
205. W. Som. Council tax is 26% lower than the average District Council in UK.
206. District Councillor to arrange a weekly list of local road closures.
207. Correspondance: One letter read out, rest circulated.
208. Finance: Balance in Sept £3315.26. Paid out £80 election expenses, £80 Audit fee, £6 Hall rent, £320 Clerk's fees, £50 Churchyard maintenance. Balance at December £2793.26. Estimated balance at December 2012 £2400. Of this £800 allocated for the bus shelter. Projected expenditure for 2012-2013 £1300. This does not include additional costs of delegated services or salt/grit bins. It was felt that the bus shelter project should not be entirely dismissed. It was agreed to increase the precept by £200.
209. Any other business:
Manor farm. It was suggested that the solar panels were larger than thought, Planning to be asked to have a look and also check on screeening.
Village Hall rep. Mr Yandle agreed to stand again.
Telephone Box. Clerk was looking into the request from the PCC for the PC to adopt it.
First Responder Training. No one other than a Councillor had expressed any interest.
Newsletter. It was agreed to publish a newsletter periodically.
Williton Master Plan. District Councillor was asked when it was going out to consultation as some of the land identified for possible future housing was in this parish.
Sampford Brett Parish Council
Annual Parish Meeting 2012
Draft Minutes
Present: Mrs J Swan (Chair), Mrs D Saunders, R Yandle, G Day, D Drabble, County Councillor A Trollope-Bellew, District Councillor S Dowding. There were 10 members of the parish present.
Apologies: Mrs S Hosegood, Miss V Yandle.
The minutes of the Annual Meeting of 2011 were read and approved.
CHAIRMAN’S REPORT: See Appendix I.
COUNTY COUNCIL MATTERS:
211. Parking on Tower Hill. Portishead Police will not agree to do anything about this saying it slows the traffic down. The Parish Council is not happy about this. A letter will be written to them from the Parish Council and anyone else who wishes to write – address can be found on the police website.
212. County Boundary Changes. We are to stay the same.
213. Council Tax. Zero per cent rise in the County element. There have been a succession of cuts and there will be more. Cuts in staffing have been made.
214. Hinkley Point. Have put in a Development Control Order which would take about a year.
215. Icelandic Bank. £25,000,000 in Icelandic Bank and the Icelandic Courts have said this must come back, but nothing as yet.
DISTRICT COUNCIL MATTERS:
216. Yellow lines on Tower Hill are being pursued by Coun. Dowding.
217. Council Tax. Zero per cent element from West Somerset District this year. There will be a serious increase next year, possibly as much as 30%. A referendum will be held to seek public opinion.
218. Gullies will be looked after by WSC for the time being.
219. WSC has signed up to the Armed Forces Covenant.
220. Planning application for Williton Supermarket is imminent.
221. Williton Master Plan not launched yet but S Dowding will find out progress.
222. West Somerset Coastpath. Negotiations are on-going with landowners.
FOOTPATH REPORT:
223. Mr Yandle said there was not much to report other than several trees had fallen across footpaths, which had been dealt with.
Telephone Kiosk:
224. The Clerk had considerable paperwork in respect of this and a request had been made by the PCC that it should be adopted. This is on-going and in the meantime the Clerk had put an order through BT that at least the box should be painted. This should be done in March.
FINANCE:
Balance bought forward at 1stApril 2011 £1707.51
As mentioned last year we had to allow for election expenses. It could have been as much as £1,000 if there had been three elections. As it happened we were only charged £80 for paperwork and expenses.
There have been talks throughout the year between Parish and District regarding services to be passed on to Parish Councils for them to organise and pay for as also mentioned last year. To date we have agreed to take over the grass cutting.
We have put on reserve £800 towards the bus shelter but resolved to use this if necessary if the bus shelter did not materialise. However, we now need to decide whether to go ahead again as there seems to be more interest.
There have been slight increases in insurance and SALC membership fees.
Clerks’ wages are slightly down as less hours have been worked.
OPEN FORUM:
A parishioner brought up the subject of the bus shelter and suggested we need a proper plan of action set up and Coun. Drabble offered to lead this.
Appendix I. Chair’s Report
1. Election last May – uncontested. Messrs. Blazey and Bulpin stood down (thank you both for all your efforts over the years); Mr D Drabble joined the council. We have one vacancy. At the first meeting I was elected Chair and Mrs Diane Saunders the vice-chair.
2. Hinkley Point – Councillors attended exhibitions and meetings with EDF, WSDC and the IPC during the course of the year. The park & ride facility has thankfully been moved to Smithyard. We have registered with IPC as an “interested party” which enables us to participate in the on-going consultation process, should we wish to do so. There is a preliminary meeting on 21stMarch.
3. Manor Farm stream – we have had several discussions with highways about the slowly collapsing bank opposite Willow Cottage. While they acknowledge that it is damaged, it is not ‘bad enough’ to warrant action. This seems a pity as it will be more costly to repair once it actually falls in. Local residents have infilled some of the collapsed ground with gravel which has made the verge less soft, but it isn’t a permanent solution.
4. Devolution of WSC services – This issue dominated the first part of the year but now looks as though it will have a minimaldirectimpact on Sampford Brett. The only affected service we have identified to date is the cutting of the verge in Croft Meadow; we hope residents will be able to take this on as it is a very small area of grass. So far as we know, street cleaning will continue (bi-monthly) as will clearing of the flood relief channel in the orchard and emptying the dog waste bin. Indirect effects will however be noticeable e.g. closure of some public toilets.
5. Tower Hill Parking – we continue to raise questions about this issue, but disappointingly there remains resistance from the police and highways to take any action.
6. Planning applications – we commented on the solar panel application from Manor Farm and asked for the planting of a tree screen to be a condition of consent. When we asked why this hadn’t been included, the planners said they had no record of our comments. We’re looking into this as the letter was hand delivered.
7. Fake speed camera – we asked planning to look into the legality of this box, which housed a security camera. We understand they served an enforcement notice but were unable to insist on its removal. Suffice to say it’s no longer there and the house has been sold.
8. Grit bins – money has been allocated to purchase two additional bins, but have not yet reached agreement as to where exactly they should be sited.
9. Phone box – we are in the process of purchasing the phone box for village use. A request has been received from the PCC to use it as a library.
10. Precept for 2012/13 – increased by £200 to £2,200 to allow money to continue to be set aside for a bus shelter. The precept equates to £15.24/year for a Band D property (an increase of £1.27) and is the 3rdlowest PC precept in W. Somerset.
11. Williton Hospital – we voiced concern about the closure of a ward but it has gone ahead and we know that one of our residents is currently unable to get a place despite daily requests from Musgrove.
D J Swan
8/3/12
Minutes of the meeting – March 2012
Draft
Present: Mrs J Swan (Chair), Mrs D Saunders, G Day, R Yandle, D Drabble, County Councillor A Trollope-Bellew, District Councillor S Dowding.
Apologies: Mrs S Hosegood.
Declaration of Interest: None
The minutes of the meeting held on 8thDecember 2011 were approved and signed as a correct record.
Matters arising:
225. Road Sweeping. District Councillor was asked if we could be notified in advance when the roads were to be swept so vehicles could be moved.
226. Brambles at the bottom of Tower Hill. Responsibility of Highways or property owners.
227. Roadworks. Clerk was still not receiving a weekly list.
Correspondence – Read to Councillors, all others had been forwarded on by e-mail.
Finance:
Clerk had given her report at the Annual meeting; outstanding payments were wages - £160 and Village Hall rent - £6.00.
County and District Councillor’s reports were given in the Annual meeting.
228. Bus Shelter. D Drabble kindly agreed to look at the file and investigate grants etc.
229. Neighbourhood Planning. Williton PC had approached us. The Clerk to write for more details.