FORTH NEIGHBOURHOOD PARTNERSHIP
CLEAN GREEN & SAFE ACTION GROUP
3rd December 2007
MINUTES
Present:, George Taylor& Lana Kelly West Pilton West Granton Community Council; Betty McVay, Tenants in Pilton; Joan Turner & George Gordon, Royston Wardieburn Community Council;Stephanie Harvey, Muirhouse Housing Association; Larke Adger, West Granton Housing Co-op; Ian Gourlay, Police; Heather MacNaughton, CastleRock Edinvar Housing Association; Norman Duncan, Muirhouse/Salvesen Community Council; Ian Cooke, North Edinburgh Trust; Ruth Stanley, SfC Community Safety; Mike Avery, SfC Housing & Regeneration; Steven Cuthill, SfC Environmental Services; Minutes: Elaine Mill, SfC Partnership and Information Team
Apologies: Martha Thom,Muirhouse Salvesen Community Council;Brenda Tonner, Muirhouse Housing Association; Lynn McDonald, Manor Estates
Alyson Cameron& Patricia Brindle, Trinity Community Council
1.Introductions and Welcome
George Gordon welcomed everyone to the meeting andintroduced himself as Chair of this Action Group for a 6 month trial period. George would welcome any comments or information for future meetings.
Contact details: or tel: 0131 552 7207/ 07768 650 337
2.Action Group Priorities
A list of current SfC priorities was circulated for discussion. (copy attached)
2.1Community Safety Priorities
Ruth Stanley explained there are now 6 Environmental Wardens based in the North Office but they cover a huge area and have a high volume of complaints. This group need to discuss how best to use the wardens.
2.2Housing Priorities
Mike Avery said the most relevant priority in this list was Property & Estates.
2.3Environmental Priorities
Update from Steven Cuthill
3.Resources
GG asked that resource budgets be made available for Forth Neighbourhood.
It was recognised we need to prioritise where the limited resources will be spent.
Lighting
Poor street lighting has been highlighted as a general problem throughout the area by both older and young people. The lighting in WestPiltonPark was raised as an issue. There are no lights again this winter and this has been a problem over the last few years. BMcV suggested replacing with uplighters which would be more difficult to vandalise. SC advised that the lights don’t seem to be broken, but have no power link at present, possibly due to the water problem at the West side of the park. SC will look into this. Action: SC
SC advised that the Service Managers should be the first point of contact for any repairs as they are tasked with solving the problem by finding out who is responsible for each repair and ensuring it is carried out.
Dog Fouling
JT raised concerns about dog fouling, in particular around shopping areas such as Boswall Parkway/Crewe Road North and Muirhouse Shopping Centres. The number of enforcements by Environmental Wardens since August 2007 is 52, with 8 of these being for dog fouling. RS agreed to ask wardens to check out shopping centres to assess the problem. It was accepted that it would not be best use of the wardens time to spend hours standing around at one location waiting to catch people out! South Edinburgh had an initiative to tackle dog fouling and borrowed wardens from other parts of the City to have a ‘crackdown’ on this. RS agreed it may be possible that South will return the favour and North could enlist the help of wardens from other areas of the City to try a similar initiative if the South proves successful. Action: RS
4.Putting Priorities into Action
The community reps agreed that the priorities list drawn up by SfC Service Managers matched that of the community. TB suggested that a wider community consultation exercise is carried out, such as Drylaw Open Spaces, to assess priorities as it is unlikely that the small representation from Community Councils will speak for the whole community. This would require funding. It was agreed if existing resources cannot meet the current priorities then this needs to be raised via the Neighbourhood Partnership who will direct it to CEC. GG asked Housing Associations to engage with their own tenants to help with the consultation. Action: Housing Associations
It is proposed that in the future main council budgets will be devolved to Neighbourhoods.
It was suggested that Community Councils dedicate one full meeting to the Clean, Green & Safe agenda to get their priorities and identify ‘hot spots’.
Action: Community Councils
IC agreed to write a proposal for C.C.’s to take this forward over the next quarter.
Action: IC
MA suggested it would be advantageous to get some quick, responsive action in identified ‘hot spots’ such as West Pilton Park lighting and dog fouling at the shopping centres and any others identified by Community Councils in addition to carrying out a wider consultation exercise to include young people, schools, housing association tenants and minority ethnic groups. Action: SfC
It was suggested we choose the top 5 priorities from the list of 15 as priorities need to be set toward the Neighbourhood Community Plan to measure indicators, key actions and outcomes.
HMcN advised it is important to note that item 2 of the Community Safety priorities should refer to “some” young people causing problems as it is only a small minority who cause the problems and also that priorities should be written in plain English.
Private Landlords- how do we get them to engage? Anti-social behaviour and cleanliness issues with some of their tenants. RS advised there are now fines and fixed penalties in place for private landlords relating to anti-social behaviour in their tenancies.
Invite Private landlords to engage with this group. Action: SfC
5.Membership, Frequency and timing of Meetings
It was agreed to hold the meetings monthly and alternate between afternoon and evening. Afternoon meetings will be at 2pm and evening meetings at 6.30pm. Draft Minutes will be sent to the Chair within 10 days of the meeting.
It was agreed that Drylaw/Telford CC could attend until a clear steer on the neighbourhood borders has been reached following the review period. Minutes and briefing notes will be sent to the secretary, Dave Pickering.
Particular issues brought to Councillors surgeries should be fed back to George, as Chair of this group or Council Officers.
6.Review Date
George Gordon will continue as Chair for 6 months and the group will be reviewed at the end of that period.
7.Any other business
It was agreed that this group will not be a public forum, but will have nominated reps from Community Councils and Tenants Groups. The Neighbourhood Partnership serves as a public forum.
Minutes will be sent to all those invited to this meeting, CC Secretaries, CC Reps and Ian Stewart from North Edinburgh Trust.
8.Date of next meeting
The next meeting is on Monday 14th January2008at 2.00pmin NELO, 8 WestPiltonGardens.