Agenda item

To receive the following announcements through the Chairman:

·       New Fly-Tipping Campaign – We’re Targeting Fly Tippers

The new We're Targeting Fly-tippers (WTF) campaign aims to combat the scourge of fly-tipping by offering residents a reward of up to £200 in high street vouchers if they report information that leads to the successful prosecution of an offender or the payment of a Fixed Penalty Notice (FPN). Email peter.white@wiltshire.gov.uk with as many details as possible to report fly-tipping.

·       British Telecom Proposed Payphones Removal Consultation

The council has received notification from BT regarding consultation on its current programme of proposed public payphone removals. BT propose to remove payphones with low usage levels following a full consultation. Wiltshire Council will also carry out a consultation. Responses received by 14 January 2020 will be included in our return to BT. Please see the agenda report for full details and email Mary Moore, Economic Development and Planning, on mary.moore@wiltshire.gov.uk to comment.

·       Community Governance Review

Wiltshire Council are undertaking a Community Governance Review, which is a process to provide the opportunity to review and make changes to governance arrangements to town and parish councils. For further information and to comment please go to http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/council-democracy-cgr.

·       Wiltshire Green Pledge

Earlier this year Wiltshire Council pledged to be carbon neutral by 2030, and its councillors have agreed to seek to make the county of Wiltshire carbon neutral by 2030.

To help with this, The Green Pledge has been launched which is asking people to commit to making small changes that can have a big positive impact on the environment.

Please go to http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/green-economy-climate-emergency to make a pledge.

The Chairman made the following announcements:

·         New Fly-Tipping Campaign – We’re Targeting Fly Tippers

The new We're Targeting Fly-tippers (WTF) campaign was announced. The campaign aimed to combat the scourge of fly-tipping by offering residents a reward of up to £200 in high street vouchers if they report information that leads to the successful prosecution of an offender or the payment of a Fixed Penalty Notice (FPN). Email peter.white@wiltshire.gov.uk with as many details as possible to report fly-tipping.

·         British Telecom Proposed Payphones Removal Consultation

The council had received notification from BT regarding a consultation on a programme of proposed public payphone removals. BT proposed to remove payphones with low usage levels following a full consultation. Wiltshire Council would also carry out a consultation. Responses received by 14 January 2020 would be included in our return to BT. Please see the agenda report for full details and email Mary Moore, Economic Development and Planning, on mary.moore@wiltshire.gov.uk  to comment. The Chairman noted that parish councils and registered charities could adopt a kiosk for £1.00. Uses for these kiosks could include mini libraries, or a space for a defibrillator.  

·         Community Governance Review

Wiltshire Council were undertaking a Community Governance Review, which was a process to provide the opportunity to review and make changes to governance arrangements to town and parish councils. For further information and to comment please go to http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/council-democracy-cgr.

·         Wiltshire Green Pledge

Earlier this year Wiltshire Council pledged to be carbon neutral by 2030, and its councillors had agreed to seek to make the county of Wiltshire carbon neutral by 2030. To help with this, The Green Pledge had been launched which was asking people to commit to making small changes that could have a big positive impact on the environment. Please go to http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/green-economy-climate-emergency to make a pledge.

·         National Grid VIP Project

The Chairman announced an exciting new project in the Devizes Area. The National Grid was currently in the early stages of developing a landscape enhancement project in the North Wessex Downs. The project would involve the removal of approximately 4km of high voltage overhead electricity line, and associated pylons, near to the Millennium White Horse, north of Devizes, and subsequently replacing it with underground cable.

The project was still in the early stages of development and National Grid was undertaking a range of ecological, archaeological and ground investigation surveys as well as meeting with local stakeholders to discuss their plans and their potential to transform this special landscape.

Given the rich archaeological heritage of the area, National Grid was working closely with local archaeologists, the Wiltshire County archaeologist and Historic England to devise the best route to bury the cables.

There would be public drop-in events in the new year where National Grid would share more information on its plans with the wider public and local people would have the opportunity to feed back their thoughts.

The Visual Impact Provision (VIP) makes use of a financial provision from the energy industry regulator, Ofgem, to deliver landscape enhancement initiatives in Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs) and National Parks to mitigate the visual impact of overhead transmission lines.

Further announcements about this project would be given at future area board meetings.