Minutes of Neighbourhood Plan Torquay

9

MINUTES OF NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN TORQUAY

Torbay Yacht Club, 6.30pm – 8.30pm

01st October 2012

Board Members:

Susie Colley (SC) Chair person

Mike Lister (ML) Vice Chair

Kerri Underhill (KU) Secretary / Minute taker

Present:

Cllr Mark Poutney Ed Heynes Roy Ashwell Andrew Gunther Chris Smith

Alan Griffey Jack Critchlow Leon Butner Usha Garrattley Margaret Spring

Howard Carter Rev Paul Ireton Marion Humble Colin Humble Cllr Alan Faulkner

Len Short John Docherty M Hoyte Pat Bishop Martin Cavanna

Lee Kerslake P Pimlott Martin Edgell Tracey Cabache John Rawson

Gerry D Pauline Baker Andrew Baker

PLEASE NOTE THERE WERE A CONSIDERABLE AMOUNT OF ATTENDEES THAT DID NOT WRITE SIGN IN AND SOME WHO DID WERE NOT CLEAR ENOUGH FOR THE ACCURACY OF THE MINUTES!!! PLEASE SIGN IN AT EVERY MEETING!!!

Item
No / Minute/Action Agreed / By whom / By when / Completed
Carried forward / Additional Note/Action
1. / Welcome, Housekeeping and Apologies
SC welcomed everybody and started the meeting. Explained the fire exits and asked everybody to sign the attendance record sheet.
Apologies: Cllr Darren Cowell, Patrick Canavan, Keith Richardson, Joy Filon, Cllr Steve Darling, Cllr Jenny Faulkner, Cindy Stocks, Cllr Alison Hernandez, Richard Maddock / SC
SC
2. / Matters Arising from 04th September 2012
Page 2: point 2 - meeting date changed from 15th – 25th and was resent out.
Page 5: point 7 – Cllr Darren Cowell has found cheaper prices and the banners have been ordered. The suggested siting’s of the banners are in front of the Town Hall, Down around the Harbour, down by the old balloon site, Hamelin Way and the Bridge over the River Quay (Torbay Road).
How about the fence around the willows area?
What does the banner say?
“ Torquay Neighbourhood Plan our opportunity for change, “ Doing nothing is not an option”
To get involved ring 01803 208831 and start building a new Torquay”
The contact details have been changed from SC to Tracey Cabache.
The other gateway has been missed out again, the one that comes from Teignmouth via Shaldon.
Why don’t we take the banner from the balloon site as we have one on the bridge and put it around St MaryChurch.
You can put it on the fence alongside the golf course.
Telephone calls that come in from the recognition of the banner, are they going to be logged for evidence?
Yes we can do this, we can log the calls.
If the banners do not work, are we going to do something else?
Yes we are, Tracey has said we are going to have another meeting regarding other ideas.
Proposed: Julie Brandon Seconded: Cllr Alan Faulkner / SC
SC
ME
AG
SC
Cllr AF
ML
Cllr AF
PB
TCabach
AG
SC
3. / AOB Declaration
Oldway
Covenant on Paignton Green linking to Babbacombe Downs
Local Plan Consultation
Princes Foundation / JB
Cllr AF
AGunth
AGunth
4. / What does Torbay’s Cultural Future Look Like?
On the 17th of October there is an exhibition talking about Torbay’s Cultural Future. I shall be going and will be letting them know that we are here (TNP)
They also need to attend our Neighbourhood Plan Meetings. / JB
ML / JB or ML or SC to ask the exhibitionists to attend our NP meetings.
5. / Ed Heynes – Roebuck House
Ed Heynes gave a presentation on the proposals that may be made to Roebuck House. The council are looking into vacating the premises end of 2012 or early 2013.
We are looking at converting the building into residential use and include 30-35 lets to include affordable housing. Also looking at building 2 stories on top.
We are holding a public consultation on the 11th of October at St Mary Magdalene Church from 8.30am to 5.15pm
What size will the units of the accommodation be? i.e. families, couples and quality etc.
The authority have suggested that we already have a number of smaller units so we are looking at a mixed size set of units at good quality. The authority would like to have family accommodation as it is a high need in Torbay.
There was a discussion on the location and timings of the meeting as well as being inappropriate for full time workers.
You suggested that you would pass on information to those who couldn’t attend the meeting, we have a website and if you allow this we could put up on our website the information for a week or so and then take it off.
Outside parking and garden space?
This is something we need to look at carefully.
There was a small discussion on the parking and space outside and around Roebuck House.
How does this development link into our neighbourhood plan?
I feel we need to be aware of any proposals that are happening within our area to link in with the housing issues in our plan, especially proposals that are being proposed within one of our main Project Groups.
Our plan says we need to have more family housing in our town and this proposal is exactly what we need.
Where is the nearest school for families, where are they going to ark their cars? Where are they going to have outside space? My personal view is that it is not going to be good for families.
I know Roebuck House very well, I would worry about going up any more floors on top of the building due to height restrictions and this is very cause for concern.
Would the multi-storey parking on opposite side of the road be used for parking?
We haven’t been in discussion with the council about this yet but I will take it back to them.
I suggest that we attend the consultation and find out the detailed plans.
This commercial building, has your employer looked into the possibility of employment?
Yes we have. We are looking at the possibility of using this for further employment but we need to take into consideration the quality of the building and other issues. / EH
PB
EH
ML
JB
EH
LB
SC
JD
JB
Cllr AF
AG
EH
SC
ML
EH
6. / Update from Project teams
(a)  Torquay Town Centre: John Docherty
(b)  Torquay Gateway: Martin Edgell
(a)  John Docherty gave a brief overview of the update from the TTC project team.
(b)  Martin Edgell gave a brief overview of the update from the Torquay Gateway project team.
Gave a positive update on his opinions from attending both meetings. Also gave an update on the consultation, plan and the ideas that go into the plan.
To Mike Lister – does that imply “get peoples ideas in, and if people don’t agree with them then change them or alter them as they are not set in stone”?
Yes we can as there is another consultation after this one.
Yes because we need 51% of the overall vote for the proposal/ideas to be agreed and set in stone. / JD
ME
ML
AG
ML
ME
7. / Report of Community Partnerships Chairs on engagement by CP’s
Can I suggest that as a new chair of a community partnership, some aspects of the plan, for completeness, can they all be tied in and link together? E.g. all CP plans to be sent to all CP’s.
We also need to strategically link with the Paignton and Brixham Neighbourhood Plan.
I ideally wanted a copy of everyone’s draft plan, but I only have a number of copies returned from the CP’s.
A brief note was made of what was received and what wasn’t.
As far as we are concerned we are succeeding with getting the CP’s drafts. / LB
ME
SC / SC to send all CP documents to everyone so they can take the items relevant to their partnership to add to their own documents etc.
8. / Banners/Consultation/Publicity
Gave a brief explanation/discussion on publicity and cosultation and gave us some ideas and information on what Paignton have done.
Who’s funding this engagement?
With the £3000 we have set aside from the £20,000, some of this will be used. Also with the help of volunteers.
Central government has noted that there is a potential extra £30,000 for plans for helping them to go forward. We will need to bid for some of this in the next couple of weeks.
I thought that the referendum wasn’t going to be funded out of the £20,000?
There has been some degree of uncertainty regarding the purpose of funding. £20,000 was awarded to the local authority to support the production of a Neighbourhood Plan (under the Front Runners scheme). The details of what this should be spent on was not made explicit. The latest information indicates that the local authority should pay for the referendum, however detail from Central Government has been sketchy as to whether the £20,000 was to help the local authority fund this. Many local authorities have asked Central Government for more clarity on this.
Perhaps as a result of this, Central Government has very recently released details of additional funding available to local authorities for Neighbourhood Planning (over and above the £20,000) – Torbay Council is currently investigating bidding for this extra money. Central Government has indicated that this extra money should help pay for the latter stages of Neighbourhood Plans, i.e. Referendums, Examinations, etc. This would therefore signify that the £20,000 allocation from Government should help fund the preceding earlier stages of Neighbourhood Plans. The Council will work with the Forum Chair and Treasurer regarding funding elements of work for the Neighbourhood Forum – according to an agreed plan and informed by the engagement strategy.
We need to draw up a detailed strategy of how we will be spending this money. / TCabach
SC
TCabach
AGunth
SC
AGunth
9. / Treasurer Matters: Patrick Canavan
Carry forward to the next meeting.
10. / AOB
(a)  Princes Foundation – gave an update on the situation with a focus meeting week to include open public meetings to gain ideas and perspectives and other workshops with Paignton and Brixham.
We are looking at the end of October, beginning of November.
It was noted that that week was half term week.
(b)  Local Plan Consultation – gave a brief explanation on the recently published Local Plan and what we want the outcomes to be and achieve. A lot of the information is on www.torbay.gov.uk/newlocalplan
Why is it called “A landscape for success” and not the Local Plan?
The title ‘A Landscape for Success’ was chosen as a title as this reflects the fact Torbay has a superb environment and that this environment underpins our future success – economically, socially, etc. The document is positive about Torbay’s qualities and is positive in terms of what a future, successful Torbay can be like.
A specific name for the new Local Plan was chosen to try and make the document more appealing to the public and external investors, etc.
I feel like we are losing time waiting for this over the whole of October.
Can you not use the next few weeks to scale over what we have done etc. and what we want to achieve and do usefully.
We need to remember this is only the 1st consultation, there will be another one around February to get representations. There is still work to be done and address on this first plan.
Princes Foundation offered an email address for advice if we have any issues, maybe Martin Edgell can start this up?
Who is writing the document , putting it together and producing the maps?
The Princes Foundation are offering their support to us and one of their proposals is to help write the plan. The Princes Foundation will help us with some of these details and issues.
I am slightly worried about the true scale of the consultation and engagement. With them possibly coming down at the end of October/early November, what do we need to do to prepare for this? What do they want to know?
The Prince’s Foundation will help the Torquay Neighbourhood Forum take the work from project groups agreed so far and help develop this further through a series of events (including community meetings and stakeholder workshops). This is with a view to producing a draft Neighbourhood Plan very quickly after November.
Each Neighbourhood Plan is getting 2 copies of the Local Plan and each CP will get 1 copy of the plan.
You said you didn’t think that the referendum couldn’t be paid with the £20,000, why?
I thought referendum and consultation was the same thing?
No it is not.
There was a large discussion on this area with a number of different views and ideas. Andy Gunther) also explained all forms of publicity they are using.
He mentioned that there has been some degree of uncertainty regarding the purpose of funding. £20,000 was awarded to the local authority to support the production of a Neighbourhood Plan (under the Front Runners scheme). The details of what this should be spent on was not made explicit at the time. The latest information indicates that the local authority should pay for the referendum, however detail from Central Government has been sketchy as to whether the £20,000 was to help the local authority fund this. Many local authorities have asked Central Government for more clarity on this.
Perhaps as a result of this, Central Government has very recently released details of additional funding available to local authorities for Neighbourhood Planning (over and above the £20,000) – Torbay Council is currently investigating bidding for this extra money. Central Government has indicated that this extra money should help pay for the latter stages of Neighbourhood Plans, i.e. Referendums, Examinations, etc. This would therefore signify that the £20,000 allocation from Government should help fund the preceding earlier stages of Neighbourhood Plans. The Council will work with the Forum Chair and Treasurer regarding funding elements of work for the Neighbourhood Forum – according to an agreed plan and informed by the engagement strategy.
How much would it cost to send out a copy of the consecutive summary to everybody’s door?
It was suggested that the consecutive summary was to be put into the Herald Express as an insert for all to see and consult.
When is the consultation meeting going to be?
Within the next 2 weeks.
(c)  Paignton Green has now been given covenants and I have been trying to get this for Babbacombe Downs which I will include in our CP document to be included in the NP.
(d)  On behalf of a local resident who could not attend the meeting for clarification on the ‘deal’ with Oldway as a recent press report seemed to suggest that the council were having to give developer £400k. Could any of the Councillors clarify.
It was clear that restoration work was needed to be done on Oldway. there had been a better deal to be had a couple of years ago but because of the delay and with the change in economic climate this was the deal that they had managed to get and we must remember that in return the building will be restored and with access to the public rather than it continuing to be neglected and further decline.
if we were effectively giving the building away could it not have gone to National Trust or English Heritage.
They were approached but would have wanted a lot more to take on Oldway. She offered to send JB further information about this and said that the Community Partnership had been fully involved too.
Cllr RE confirmed the above issues and TCabache said the National Trust would not take it on unless it come with £1million. / AGunth
AGunth
SC
AGunth
ME
AGunth
PB
ML
AGunth
TCabach
AGunth
AGunth
AG
AGunt
SC/ML
SC
PB
TCabach
Cllr AF
JB
MC
JB
TCabach

Meeting closed at 8.40pm