Meeting of 17 March 2016
UPLOWMAN PARISH COUNCIL: MINUTES OF MEETING
Held on 17th March 2016 at the Village Hall, Uplowman starting at 7.30pm.
Approved on 11 May 2016
Cllr D Hannon (DCC) present.
Minutes taken by Mr R Hodgson, Clerk. Action points in bold.
- MEMBERS PRESENT
1.1 Present: Cllr T Milner (Chairman), Cllr R Branton, Cllr R Adcock, Cllr R Norman, Cllr K Baugh, Cllr S Floyd and Cllr A McCombe.
- PROCEDURAL MATTERS & APOLOGIES
2.1 No apologies had been received and all councillors were present.
- MINUTES OF LAST MEETING (21 January 2016)
3.1 The Draft Minutes of the Meeting held on 21st January 2016 had been circulated. The Minutes were agreed without change and were signed as a true record of that meeting.
- MATTERS ARISING FROM THE MINUTES
4.1 There was nothing that would not be covered by Agenda items.
- FINANCES
5.1 Current Balance: £4082.83
Income since last meeting: £ Nil
5.2 The following payments were approved and cheques signed to effect the disbursements:
PHS Engineering, for repair to sign post (£480.00, already paid) WJ Veen, for Grass cutting (£35.20)
W J Veen, for painting sign post (£325.00)
R Hodgson, Clerk's salary (£510.00) plus expenses (£12.80)
Watermans, Sports equipment for UHRA (£52.04).
5.3 The Clerk presented a draft reconciliation of receipts and payments for the year for the Councillors' information and consideration. This document was duly noted.
5.4 As discussed at the January meeting, the Chair had redrafted a UPC Reserves Policy and a Procedure for letting contracts, which had been circulated. The Contract procedure was agreed by al and signed as approved. The Clerk had enquired of other local councils whether they had Reserves Policies. None had, although some were preparing them. The proposed reserve of £3500 to cover a range of eventualities was considered appropriate with the proviso that the wording be changed to show that these were 'indicative' costs, not hard and fast ones. The Chair would reword for subsequent approval.
- PLANNING/LICENSING APPLICATIONS
6.1 16/00189/HOUSE Uplowman House: swimming pool UPC had no objection
6.2 15/01797/F: 2 Staplegate Cott. Change of use to lorry park. Has been passed by MDDC
6.3 15/00979/OUT Little Chase Uplowman: Appeal has been dismissed
6.4 16/00272/FULL: Church View, Uplowman, replace porch. This was discussed and UPC had no objection.
6.5 16/00318/HOUSE: Jasper's Green, Convert garage. Cllr Floyd declared a personal interest as the Applicant and left the room. The application was discussed; it was understood to be for an annex for a dependent relative and it was agreed by all that UPC had no objection. Mrs Floyd was invited to return to the meeting.
6.6 16/00382/FULL: Widhayes, new cattle shed. This was discussed and UPC had no objection.
- CORRESPONDENCE
A list of correspondence received and sent had been circulated. Attention was drawn to the following items of interest that were not covered elsewhere:
7.1 Clerks & Councils Direct magazine reported that a Norfolk County Councillor had been so busy that his family reported him 'missing'. Cllr Hannon took note! It also included a 'Legal Notes' article on conduct of public meetings, which had been circulated to councillors for information.
7.2 Details of medals available to commemorate Her Majesty the Queen's forthcoming 90th birthday had been received. Councillors discussed buying these for distribution but decided against doing this.
- HALL AND RECREATION ASSOCIATION
8.1 Cllr Adcock said that the Hall website was almost ready. He noted that the beer and music festival would be repeated this summer.
- EMERGENCY PLANNING AND NEIGHBOURHOOD WATCH
9.1 No report had been received. The Clerk said he had received information about a current scam in which callers state that the victim has been wrongly banded for council tax and that it will be corrected on payment of an administration fee.... The message is: never give money to cold callers!
- VILLAGE IMPROVEMENT PROJECTS
10.1 Work on the telephone box still awaited award of the TAP grant. The Clerk said that the TAP application had been submitted both electronically and in paper form but he had not heard any response. Cllr Hannon had not yet been asked to approve it. The Clerk would email Cllr Hannon and MDDC to establish the status of the application.
10.2 Recent wet weather had prevented undertaking of the ground works for the new hall benches. These would be put in place before the end of the financial year.
10.3 It was proposed to hold a Parish Social event at a date to be fixed in June or July. The Chair would discuss with the Ferrets history group and with the Hall committee to decide on a date. When a date was fixed the Clerk would produce a flier.
10.4 Repairs to the cross-roads sign post were completed and the result was excellent. The Clerk would email all to propose a date for a photo to be taken of all involved for publication.
10.5 The Chair had talked to J White, Chair of the School Governors, regarding parking signs at the school. He would look at where they should be mounted and get quotations. Cllr Hannon added that he had discussed with the Head Teacher who had promised to address the issue with parents. Cllr Norman said that there had been no significant improvement in accessibility along school lane recently.
10.6 The Clerk informed councillors that UPC business would be on a new website hosted by MDDC from the start of April. The address would be https://parish.middevon.gov.uk/uplowman and the new site would have considerably more functionality than the previous one, possibly including a diary and a blog where the parish news would be added each month. The Clerk also noted a new email for PC business was now operating at UplowmanPC@btconnect.com and he asked that all correspondence should now use this.
- STATE OF ROADS IN PARISH
11.1 Entrance to the Church: this had been made up with stone by Councillor Norman.
- DATE OF NEXT MEETING
The next meeting would be the Annual Meeting scheduled for Wednesday 11th May 2016
The meeting closed at 9.10pm
Public discussion.
There had been no public discussions
Minutes of 17th March 2016