Parish Council - next meeting

Tuesday 12 Jun 2018

The next meeting will be held in the Village Hall at 7.00pm on 12 June. This is the Agenda for the meeting.

Item 6: Redevelopment of Village Hall

The sums involved with the rebuilding of the Village Hall will amount to half a million pounds or more, much of it funded from our council tax over the next 50 years, so it is only to be expected there is public scrutiny over how this sum is being spent.

Looking back in my blog dated 16 Feb 2018, I summarised the Tree Officer's concerns over the planning application. Since then, we have seen that planning permission has been granted, but with certain conditions. I note that before any work can commence demolishing the current Village Hall, North Kesteven District Council have required site investigation works to be undertaken.

1. I am interested to see if the scope and nature of these works have now been agreed with the District Planning Authority - and whether or not this work has been contracted out and what the extra burden will be on the public purse?
2. With the delay in starting work on rebuilding the Village Hall and potential alterations to the construction design, is it clear yet how this will impact on the overall projected costs from Simons Construction e.g. will the revised costing still be able to be contained within the extent of a Public Works Loan of £500,000... or will further funds have to be raised?
3. There were also other issues to be ratified, one of which is concerning legal advice on a number of covenant-related matters. This also involved contact with the owner of the Village Hall car park to obtain approval to the new designs for the Village Hall. Whilst I see this is proposed to be dealt with following the exclusion of the public and press, a broad outline of the issues involved could perhaps be highlighted?

I see there is an Agenda entry about the Proposed Redevelopment of the Village Hall for the meeting on Tuesday 12 Jun 2018. It would be very helpful to the community if councillors could give a comprehensive update of the current situation, especially regarding the above mentioned aspects.

Response from Parish Council

From: Ian Goldsworthy
Sent: Monday 11 June, 11:29
Subject: RE: agenda on website
To: Geoff Hall

Dear Geoff,

Thank you for your email of 8 June, 2018 to the Parish Clerk. Which Ruth has forwarded to me as she is now on holiday for two weeks.

There was, in fact, a very detailed discussion about the project to rebuild our village hall at the Annual Parish Meeting on 22 May when all of the points you have raised, and others, were covered with Simons’ representatives who were also present. As you have noted, there will be a further discussion and update on this matter at the Parish Council meeting tomorrow which, of course, you would be most welcome to attend.

I would, however, like to reassure you that as councillors we are working extremely hard to ensure that the overall cost of the project is kept as low as possible as we are all acutely aware of the need to minimise the call on the public purse.

Kind regards
Ian Goldsworthy
Chair of Nocton Parish Council

The following is an extract of my reply:

From: Geoff Hall
Sent: Monday 11 June, 13:21
Subject: RE: agenda on website
To: Ian Goldsworthy

Hi Ian

Thanks for the reply.

I note your comments but have concerns that the meeting you refer to has no formal record of proceedings or content.

I and possibly others, were unable to attend the Annual Parish Meeting and I may not be able to attend Tuesday either due to personal reasons, hence my email to the Clerk.

Non attendees can only rely on formal Minutes and the Parish Council is there to cater to all the populous, not just the few who can attend meetings.

I would therefore hope that the full details of the current situation can be documented on Tuesday evening...

Regards,
Geoff