Minutes from the meeting 13th July 2021

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Minutes of the meeting of Sherington Parish Council held at the Pavilion on Tuesday 13th July 2021, commencing at 7.30 pm

PRESENT: Cllrs Hindler (Chair), McNeil, Mears, Nokes, Palmer, Meldrum, and Shires, Parish Clerk Will Pike, assistant Clerk Lauren Scott

ALSO ATTENDING: 3 members of the public.

  1. RECEIVE AND ACCEPT APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

None

  1. RECEIVE ANY DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

Cllr Shires as the owner of Pavilion field and contractor that deals with verges and hedges.

  1. APPROVE MINUTES FROM LAST MEETING

Approved.

  1. RECEIVE PUBLIC COMMENTS

A member of the public asked why the ward councillors report section had been removed from the agenda and why the ward councillors had been made to feel unwelcome. The member of the public was assured that the ward councillors are more than welcome, but their section of the agenda had been removed as they could speak under public comment.

  1. RECEIVE PCSO REPORT

No report had been provided. Parish clerks will continue to invite them.

  1. REVIEW ACTION LOG

This is available to all councillors.

  1. CLERKS REPORT

Assistant Parish Clerk : Lauren Scott provided the following updates:

A change to the PC website is in process, this will mean changing to a Gov.UK domain name and issuing all councillors with councillor email addresses attached to the site as a central record keeping hub.

  1. VILLAGE CARETAKERS REPORT

Jeff Charles commented that with the inclement weather there wasn’t much to report but work was underway to prepare the area for the MUGA.

Jeff also enquired if any councillors had been approached by Open reach as a number of vans have been spotted doing work around the village, although none had been approached in an official capacity a councillor informed him that this is just investigative work looking into the possibility of bringing faster broadband to the village.

  1. PROJECT GROUPS

9.1           PAVILLION: It was confirmed that the door supplier had been contacted but due to national shortages the fitting had been pushed back again.

The pitch move will go ahead as planned.

9.2           M.U.G.A: Ian has been chasing the S106 money and will continue to do so, work starts on the MUGA next week.

9.3           SHOP: Cllr Meldrum will give an update in a separate meeting

9.4           BARN CO: A committee has been formed and is drawing up TOR’s

9.5           LANDSCAPING: It was noted that the path between Sherington and Newport Pagnell is overgrown again, councillors are chasing a more permanent solution, but as this area is MK councils responsibility, they will cut the verges as part of their scheme of works.

The overgrown verges on the Bedford Road and Gun Lane that are making it difficult to see while driving and narrowing the road will be cut back by Cllr Shires, a small debate ensued as to the timing of this cut to balance out vehicular safety and the safety of ground-nesting fledglings. It was taken to vote, Cllr Shires abstained from voting as he has an interest, the votes were tied at 3 to cut as soon as practicable and 3 to leave for a few more weeks, the chair had the casting vote so the verges will be cut as soon as practicable.

It was agreed that during the first few months of the year the grass cut provided by RTM every 3 weeks was too long between cuts, this meant that there was an excess of cut grass clippings leading it to look untidy, LS to investigate the possibility of doing fortnightly cuts for the first 3 or 4 months of the year.

9.6           DRAINAGE No updates currently.

9.7           HIGHWAYS: Cllrs Meldrum and Nokes are to set up a separate meeting to discuss further.

  1. FINANCE
  2. It was agreed by unanimous vote to add Assistant Clerk Lauren Scott to the Metro Bank Mandate with the same level of access as Clerk William Pike.

10.1         MONTHLY BALANCES:

                Current Account:     £26,861.05

                Savings Account:     £35,474.40

                Payments Due:        £2,651.39 (Plus further invoices to come)

                Total Funds:            £59,684.06

10.2         APPROVE INVOICES FOR PAYMENT: All were approved along with ‘placeholders’ for invoices due but not yet received.

10.3         BUDGET: Ongoing

                LS to write out a plan of training required, costs and timings to add to the budget.

  1. PLANNING APPLICATIONS:

The portal was not working at the time, so it was agreed to add new planning to the website as soon as possible.

12.3         ANY OTHER APPLICATIONS: None

  1. CONSIDER CORRESPONDENCE AND NEW CONSULTATIONS:

Ongoing meetings regarding legal matters.

  1. EXTERNAL MEETINGS:

A meeting date was set for 26th July to discuss Shop and BarnCo business.

  1. COUNCILLORS ITEMS:

Cllr Meldrum has had 2 volunteers come forward to work on the neighbourhood plan update currently and councillors will go back to previous NP volunteers to ask for their continued support.

A budget needs to be agreed to pay for professional advice, this will be added to the agenda for the September meeting.

A councillor brought to the attention of the parish council that a sign had been removed at the beginning of the walk to stonepits Copse leaving a dangerous rusty stump – The village caretaker will make this safe as soon as possible.

  1. DATE OF NEXT MEETING:

Tuesday 7th September at 7.30 pm at the Pavilion subject to any ongoing restrictions.

Useful Contact Information

Parish Council Clerk (Interim):

  • Jacqueline Galloway
  • 07494 760791

Chair:

  • Peter Palmer
  • 07710 242521

Other council members

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