myKnaphillAgreed Minutes
KRA Committee Meeting 24 October 2012 – Kings House Coffee Shop
Attendees: – John Butler (chairman), Ann Mason, Martin Dunham, Andy Hills Tony Polak, Neville Hinks, Tony Hayes-Allen, Phil Stubbs.
Apologies: – Debbie Harlow, Rachel Varney
- Minutes of the last meeting
The minutes of the meeting held on 26 September 2012 were approved.
- Matters Arising
The majority of action points are covered by the agenda items and will be covered under their own heading.
- Projects
- Christmas decorations
Andy reported that there had been two blocks of shops where the shop keeper would like to have Christmas decorations but the proposal had been rejected by the owners of their properties. Thirteen properties have accepted the invitation to have a bracket placed outside their shop and 3 public houses are also on board.
The brackets have been purchased and plans will now be set in place to have the brackets fitted.
On finances, there was £1450 in the bank and the funding had received a grant of £1,100 from the County’s Community fund.
Tony Polak asked if we were going to have a special switching on event. Andy replied that the suggestion would be taken on board.
3.2 Litter collection
Ann and Tony Polak reported that everything had been arranged for volunteers to meet to tidy up the village on Saturday 10 November. Posters have been placed in shops and suitable notice boards and WBC had agreed to supply all the necessary equipment and refuge bags. It had been noticed that someone, we believe the police, had arranged for a litter collection by young people on 2 November but it was felt that this should not interfere with our plans, plenty of litter to go round.
John stated that teas and coffees would be made available to volunteers in the Kings House after the litter collection.
Action point: – Phil to inform the local press of the event.
- Village meeting
Following the discussion at our meeting on 26 September John had taken on board all the points made at the last meeting and had also spoken with Rev. Richard Sherlock. Richard had indicated to John that he was willing to act as chairman for such an event and had suggested that March would be a good month to hold the meeting.
The idea is that we invite a spokesperson’s for the Council, Councillors and the KRA who would answer questions. The suggestion is that questions are requested prior to the meeting so that Richard can group the questions into subject areas and pull them together and so engineer a constructive meeting.
It was suggested that we might like to invite the Police Commissioner.
It was agreed that we should try and book the church hall at Holy Trinity.
The possible dates being March 7th or 14th.
Action points: – Phil to make contact with Holy Trinity on the availability of the
Church hall.
John to make contact with local Councillors.
- Brookwood Farm
The official position is that the plans submitted by Cala Homes are still under consideration by the local planning authority (WBC). It is understood that there are two major issues that the Council are trying to resolve to make the development sustainable; primary school places and traffic congestion.
In June of this year SCC announced that they were looking for land on which to build a new school in the Knaphill/Brookwood area. The County’s Education Officer confirmed that neither Knaphill Lower School nor Knaphill School had sufficient room for any additional classrooms. Two demountable classrooms have been added to St. Johns School and the County are consulting local residents in Bisley about building two permanent classrooms at their school. The Bisley project is purely to provide school places for the children of troops if they are placed at Pirbright camp.
On roads and in particular the A322 & A324, the problem of congestion on these roads was raised at the October meeting of SCC’s Local Committee and the County’s Highways Authority were asked to report to the December meeting on any ideas and or plans that will improve the flow of traffic on the two roads especially where they meet at Brookwood Crossroads.
- Planning Issues
The secretary circulated a planning report prior to the meeting. Since that report was circulated news had come through that WBC had purchased the old Library at 20 High Street from SCC. WBC planned to build affordable apartments for elderly residents with a memorial garden at the front of the new building.
Phil had some concerns because the press release from WBC stated that they would use an already agreed outline plan for their proposed building. The agreed plan includes a plan for an underground car park with an access road out onto the High Street. Phil planned to seek clarification from the local Councillors.
- Membership update
Ann had received three new applications this month.
It was agreed that the membership fees should remain unchanged for 2013.
- Chairman’s report
John had nothing to add to the points he had made under the various agenda headings.
- Treasurer’s report
John reported that we were coming to the end of this financial year and that he would be drawing up the accounts at the end of the year.
- Secretary’s report
Phil reported that he and Paul Gray met with Jonathan Lord MP, Cllr. John Kingsbury, Douglas Spinks Deputy Chief Executive and Earnest Amoako Planning Policy Officer on 19 October. The meeting had been suggested by Mr Lord and Cllr. Kingsbury following our criticism of WBC’s interpretation of the new National Planning Policy Framework.
During the meeting we raised a number of issues including the Council’s handling of planning applications from Sainsbury’s for the extension of their store in Redding Way, the development of Clifton’s in the High Street and Brookwood Farm. On Sainsbury’s WBC acknowledged that they had received a formal complaint from the KRA and therefore would not answer any questions on that planning decision during this meeting. WBC also failed to respond to points raised about the plans agreed for the redevelopment of the old Clifton’s site. Finally the meeting turned to Brookwood Farm and WBC stated that the KRA were wrong in assuming that the Local Planning Authority were just going through the formalities of considering the plans as the Council had already given its go ahead to the development. Mr Spinks stated that LPA were examining a number of issues in connection with this planning application and no decisions had yet been made.
Phil reported that Tesco’s had confirmed that they were to take over of the lease of the proposed new store at 15 High Street. Tesco’s had informed local Councillors that they would be in contact with local residents in the near future.
Since June there had been significant changes to the landscape as one walks around the fields that separate Knaphill from Bisley, commonly known as the Priory fields even though the Priory do not own these fields. The most worrying fact was that the tenant had put down a temporary track across three fields and had started to dump waste material in the field. SCC had placed a temporary stop notice on dumping or removing any of the material until they had analysed the material. Phil hoped that Cllr. Saj Hussain could arrange a meeting with the tenant so that we can outline residents’ concerns and the tenant can outline his long term plans.
- Editors update
Andy reported that he had started work on the Christmas edition of the magazine and as usual the local churches would have two pages to give details of their Christmas services. John reported that all those who advertised in the last edition had paid.
There was still a need to cut the costs of the magazine and it was agreed to revert to the use of volunteers to distribute the newsletter. Neville gave details of the streets that were not covered and a number of the Committee members offered to cover some of those on the list.
It was agreed that the magazine would be delivered to The Garibaldi where the magazines would be divided into streets and Phil agreed to distribute to the volunteers. It is intended to publish the magazine on 3rd December.
Action points: – John to update the list of uncovered streets.
Neville to contact the volunteers and confirm that they are available to distribute the Christmas edition of the magazine.
- Police Forum
Tony Hays-Allen attended the local Police Forum last week and reported that the main message from the police was that they were being kept busy with various issues. Tony asked the police why the force had not commented on the application from the owners of the petrol station at Brookwood Crossroads for a 24 hour alcohol licence. The police stated in reply that there was no history of any pre-existing misbehaviour due to the opening times of the garage shop and therefore the police had no evidence to bring to the attention of the licencing authority.
A question was raised with regards to the inconsiderate parking by some in Chobham Road, especially in the vicinity of Holy Trinity and Knaphill Lower School. The police stated that as there were no road restrictions there was little action that they could take.
The police stated that they were looking into reported speeding problems in Knaphill.
- Any other business
There were no items of AOB.
- Date of next meetings
The next three scheduled meetings are as follows;
14 November 2012 – Meeting to be held at Kings House Coffee Shop at 7.45pm
16 January 2013 – Meeting to be held at the Garibaldi at 7.00 pm. The meeting to be followed by refreshments.
6 February 2013 – Venue to be decided.
Meeting closed
myKnaphill 