Agenda and minutes

The Chairman, Councillor Richard Britton welcomed everyone to the meeting of the Southern Wiltshire Area Board, and apologised for the late cancellation of the last meeting due to snow.

Karen Linaker, the new CEM for Southern Wiltshire and South West Wiltshire Area Boards was introduced.

Apologies for absence were received from:

·       Whiteparish Parish Council – Item 9 Parish Session

To approve and sign as a correct record the minutes of the previous meeting held on Thursday 28^th November 2018.

Decision

The minutes of the previous meeting held on 28 November 2018 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

To receive any declarations of disclosable interests or dispensations granted by the Standards Committee.

The following Declarations of Interest were received:

·       Cllr McLennan noted that his daughter had applied for Health & Wellbeing funding  and would not take part in discussion or the vote for that application.

To receive Chairman’s Announcements including:

·       CATG

The Chairman made the following announcements:

·       Regular attendee, Roger Yeates, had passed away on New Year’s Day. He was a valued contributor at the Area Board and would be missed. 

·       The CATG meeting scheduled for 13^th February had been cancelled due to insufficient business. The next CATG meeting would now be held on 3^rd April.

The Great British Spring Clean Event – The Council was seeking guidance on whether this annual event would be promoted following the Salisbury and Amesbury Novichok events, as advice previous issued was not to pick up anything you had not dropped. Until this was resolved the Council would not be running the initiative.

The Chairman said that Parishes were able to organise their own events; however, subsequent to this Wiltshire Council’s Recovery Co-ordinating Group has made the decision not to request that Public Health England reviews the guidance that it issued in the summer: namely “if you didn’t drop it, don’t pick it up”. This advice therefore remains in place.  However, Wiltshire Council is considering how it could provide additional litter picks in the south of the county until such time as the guidance is reviewed and will be able to update Councillors shortly.

Question:

If parishes did organise an event, would the rubbish still be collected by the council?  Answer: The CEM would enquire whether there were arrangements to collect the rubbish, and would feedback.

Boundary Commission Proposals

Cllr Clewer gave an update on the proposals from the Local Government Boundary Commission for England (LGBCE) which had just been released.

The LGBCE had sent through a number of maps, which were currently being converted for printing. Many of the proposals for the county seemed sensible, while in other areas they were more inconsistent.

In particular in Westbury & Laverstock there were proposals for unnecessary split rural and urban divisions which the Wiltshire Council submission tried to avoid.

A consultation was underway and would run until 15^th April. Anyone can take part and submit comments. This was the last chance to have any influence in the process.

For the Southern Area, the proposals are for a Winterslow and Alderbury Division, a Downton and Whiteparish Division and a Redlynch and Landford Division.

The LGBCE propose that Laverstock should be split in to three divisions, two of those include large parts of Salisbury.

They suggest that St Marks and Bishopdown remains as it stands.

That a Salisbury Milford and Laverstock south division are grouped together including Clarendon Park.

They also suggest Laverstock North Division including Longhedge, Old Sarum Ford and the Parish of Firsdown.

Britford and Odstock become part of the Fovant and Chalke Valley division, taking them out of the Southern Wiltshire Community Area. 

These proposals would potentially reduce the Southern Wiltshire Area Board to a three Member Board. We currently have other area boards with three Members and they struggle.

The impact this would have on the Board would be significantly less funding. Five Members is as low as an Area  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

·       National Armed Forces Day 2019

·       Fire & Rescue Service: ‘We are DWFire’ video

·       Wiltshire Council Updates:

1.    Polling District and Place Review

2.    Special Schools Consultation

·       Healthwatch Wiltshire

·       CCG

·       Current consultations

http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/council/consultations.htm

The Board noted the papers attached to the agenda and considered one funding request.

National Armed Forces Day 2019 

The Board considered the request for funding towards this Countywide initiative everyone is invited to get involved in.

Karen was working with Laverstock Woman’s Institute on a tapestry contribution from this area to the project.

Decision

The Southern Wiltshire Area Board awarded £1,000 towards the National Armed Forces Day initiative.

Written papers available in the pack and circulated at the meeting:

• Fire & Rescue Service: ‘We are DWFire’ video
• Wiltshire Council Updates:

1.    Polling District and Place Review

2.    Special Schools Consultation

• Healthwatch Wiltshire
• CCG
• Current consultations: http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/council/consultations.htm

a) Parish Councils and Community groups

b) Community Policing – local issues and priorities

Community Police Team Management will be present.

Community Policing – Inspector John Hutchings

In addition to the written report included in the pack, Inspector Hutchings noted:

·       Major things we have dealt with since the last update were the Winter Solstice & Remembrance parades. A lot of Officers were involved with policing those occasions.

·       I have made a commitment over last few Area Boards to endeavour to attend community events you have asked us to, where possible. That offer continues.

·       Neighbourhood Tasking Groups were discussed at the last meeting – We have managed to make an in way with that.

·       Special Constabulary continue to provide support. Last year our volunteers provided over 75k hours of service to support us.

Questions:

·       Landford - We have massive theft problem, farms, vehicles, houses, what are police intending to do? Answer – We are not receiving daily reports so I would urge people to report every incident. Earlier today we arrested an individual in London regarding a theft in Landford, he has been on the run since 2013. He was sent back to prison by the court. We are regularly policing the Landford area and it regularly comes up as a Community Speedwatch (CSW) area. I will take on board your concerns. We have got into a bit of a rut with farms as they feel that nothing will be done. But we need incidents to be reported. We put these reports together and create a targeted response.

·       Cllr Devine – There is no one from the PCC here tonight. None of the new reported Officers will come to our area. Answer: The Chairman noted that he was also the Chairman of the Police and Crime Panel (PCP). There were issues with roads, dogs and firearms, until recently they were operated by a tri-force collaboration from which Avon and Somerset withdrew recently. The 40 posts referred to was a genuine increase, over and above those functions. The resourcing of those teams would be monitored as the extra officers are deployed throughout the county.

·       Following a visit by PC Matt Holland to a recent Downton meeting, where he said that if people did not report incidents then nothing would be done, we are more aware now and we report all incidents, and we do see a Police presence in the village.

·       Chairman – In the area where I do CSW the Police have twice stopped to support the team and show a presence. This is much                        appreciated by the volunteers.

Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC)

The Chairman noted that the consultation period had now passed. The PCP had now approved the increase to the precept of £24 per average D band property.

Following our theme of inter-parish collaboration, we have asked to hear from parishes about some of their projects which may be of interest or relevant to other parishes. This time;

• Whiteparish PC Skatepark
• Landford/Whiteparish PC SID projects (This important project forms the basis of area board SID projects outlined below)

Whiteparish Skatepark

Due to the reschedule of the Area Board date coinciding with the Whiteparish Parish Council meeting, they were unable to attend to present. This update would be rescheduled for a future date.

Landford/Whiteparish SID project

John Fairhurst & Ken Parker from Landford PC.

We first installed the device in November. Since then we have had positive feedback, including one mother who told us that her child asks her to drive slowly so that they could bring up the smiley face.

The location we use is the same location we do one of the Speedwatch sessions with the CSW team. The unit weighs 10kg and batteries weigh 10kg. The device is secured with a padlock.

These units will record 200m out, however we set ours to 10m and 20m. Each time we install the device we do a test to see it is functioning correctly and a passing vehicle test.

Our device has Bluetooth, so you can use a mobile phone to run a diagnostic and take the data down.

We believed that it would work with two villages sharing the cost of a device. We operate on a 3 week on and 3 weeks off schedule.

We are learning what we can do with this device, and sharing best practice with other villages.

Data shows the average speed of the cars in a 30 minute interval. Data has shown that some people in Landford are travelling at 68mph in a 30mph area, close to a primary school.

The volume of traffic in Landford is 53k vehicles in a 3 week period. At 3pm in the afternoon we have recorded vehicles travelling at 86mph.

The Area Board gave us one third of the project cost.

I have produced an educational video I am happy to share with anyone interested.

Questions:

·       Cllr Devine - The A36 is one of the most heavily policed roads, I am surprised at the speeds recorded there.

·       Do you think having the device has had any impact on reducing the overall speed? Answer: Absolutely. I Have seen the cars come in and drop their speed. The majority of people are slowing down, I find this very encouraging.

·       Is there a logic that says you need a device at each end of the village? Answer: The answer is yes. Our device is moveable, these things work best if they can move around. We will move ours around the village.

·       Elaine Hartford – Can you forward your powerpoint and video to me? Answer: We are still learning what we can do with the info and how best to share it.

·       You have evidence on people who are regular offenders. Could the Police not act on this? Answer: Police – Certainly, as a Roads Policing Officer for most of my career, we have to look at diverse options to catch the offenders. Enforcement does impact on people’s lives, just as speeding does. It is difficult to commit resources to something that could happen, rather  ...  view the full minutes text for item 8.

·       Proposal for new approach

• Consider the project in Downton/Redlynch

The Chairman explained that there was up to £850 of funding available to Parish Collaborations wishing to take up a SID project. Parishes interested should contact the CEM, Karen Linaker, who has the video and slides to circulate.

With regards to the installation of these devices there were two options available: 

·       Operating model 1: Contractor – They would install, remove, charge and reinstall. There were 2 operators in the area. The CEM can supply the contact details. It was likely to be £40-80. It’s advisable to seek quotes.

·       Operating model 2: Volunteers – training required for anyone to undertake work on our highways. The cost of this is around £250 per person. Training required: NRSWA Unit 2, Signing, Lighting and Guarding course.

Simon Nightingale - Contractor

I am a Project Engineer for the Test Valley Borough Council, and am able to offer my knowledge as a Highways Engineer, and I live in Wiltshire.

I would be happy to help parishes as a contractor to carry out this role. It is best to use a site for 2 – 4 weeks before moving the SID.

There can be issues with using volunteers, when people are away or move or just decide they no longer wish to contribute. This is when a contractor may be a better option. Parish partnerships that share a device are a good idea.

The Chairman ended by saying that Simon and John had a mine of information, urging people to make any approach through Karen if they wanted to take this forward. The Board encouraged these collaborations.

Funding Bid

The Board considered the bid from Downton PC and Redlynch PC who were ready to go ahead as a collaboration. 

Decision

The Area Board awarded up to a maximum of £800 to the Downton PC and Redlynch PC collaboration.

Following previous discussion at the Board on this project, only one or two parishes had come forward initially. The Board would liaise with the Highways Engineer on how best to fund this.  

If people have a bus shelter project they wish to pursue, the Board could treat it as a Community Area Grant project.

Question:

·       Landford PC was one of the parishes that did submit a request. Shall we contact the CEM to move that forward? Answer: Yes, work with Karen to take this forward.

The Board will consider one Health & Wellbeing Grant and four applications for funding from the Community Area Grant Scheme, as detailed in the report attached to the agenda.

Officer: Community Engagement Manager

Health and Wellbeing Funding

The Board considered one bid for funding from Music for Wellbeing CIC, who had requested £850 for the Uke can do it project at Old Sarum as detailed in the report.

There was £7,147.50 remaining in the Health & Wellbeing budget for 2018/19.

Cllr McLennan had declared an interest as the applicant was his daughter. He did not take part in the discussion or vote on this application.

Uke Can Do It – Old Sarum Ukulele Band

A pilot collaborative community music project between Music for Wellbeing CIC, Avonbourne Care Centre and Old Sarum Primary School. To establish a fully inclusive, intergenerational ukulele band for the Old Sarum area to test popularity and see if can become a sustainable group for the community.

The applicant Olivia McLennan was in attendance to answer any questions. 

Questions:

·       The Board’s role was to provide seed funding to get things started. Answer: There is other project funding available and some participants may be able to contribute.

·       How many people would benefit? Answer: Up to 30

·       Where will the Ukes come from? Answer: They have already been donated by a charity.

Decision

The Southern Wiltshire Area Board awarded £850 to Music for Wellbeing CIC for the Uke Can Do it project at Old Sarum.

Community Grant Funding

The Board considered four applications for funding from the Community Area Grant scheme for 2018/19, as detailed in the report.

There was £18,109.43 remaining for Community Area Grants for 2018/19.

Landford Parish Council – Nomansland recreation ground, children’s play area fence

To install a fence around the play area to meet safety standards.

The applicant was in attendance to answer questions:

Questions:

·       Why was a fence required? Answer: The play area was not currently fenced in, there was a problem with dogs and the proximity to the car park.

Cllr Randall – This project had arisen due to the change of boundaries, as they had inherited Nomansland.

Decision

The Southern Wiltshire Area Board awarded £5,000 to Landford Parish Council for the Nomansland Recreation ground children’s play area fence.

Landford Parish Council – Landford recreation ground, installation of two bully gates.

The Landford Recreation ground play park gates were both in need of replacing to be self-closing gates in line with ROSPA recommendations. It was essential to undertake the remedial work and gate move as soon as possible as there are currently safety issues.

Cllr Randall - This is a Health & Safety issue, they cannot have the exit onto a fast track.

Cllr Clewer - If there is a Health & Safety issue it is something the PC should be doing as a matter of course.

Decision

The Southern Wiltshire Area Board awarded £1581.50 to Landford Parish Council for the Landford Recreation Ground two bully gates.

BWSCA - Downton Football Club lights & Netting

Additional lighting to increase the use of facilities to youth teams. Netting to protect the Leisure centre building.

The Manager of Downton football club not here as he was  ...  view the full minutes text for item 11.

The Chairman ended by announcing that tonight represented the end of an era. The Community Engagement Manager, Tom Bray had left Wiltshire Council.

Tom had worked with us since the inception of the Area Boards in 2009. He had enthusiastically supported the work of the AB and those in our community area, committed to what we are trying to do. We have valued working with Tom, and shall miss him.

The Board wished Tom every success with what he does next.

Tom gave thanks to everyone he had worked with over the years.