MILTON ERNEST PARISH COUNCIL REPORT

by Brian Gale

The most recent meeting of Milton Ernest Parish Council was held on 29th March 2012 in All Saints Church, Milton Ernest.

The meeting proper was preceded by the Annual Parish Assembly at which the Chair, Cllr Inskip, reviewed developments through the year, mentioned the grants made to various village enterprises including the Church, noted the evolution in social groups within the village and thanked people for their support and contributions.

The meeting proper commenced with Cllr Inskip announcing that a meeting has been arranged for 19^th April for herself, resident Steve Freshwater and the clerk to discuss the whole situation around traffic up Thurleigh Road, including the closure of the Twinwoods Business Park gate, with the Borough mayor. With the owners of the Business Park in receivership, the future of the proposed quarterly meetings of tenants and MEPC is in abeyance.

The “Average Speed” camera project is still on course with the project scheduled to proceed and preparatory work already being done. It was unclear if the removal of the VAS sign was part of these works; the clerk will check with the Highways Dept.

Cllr Inskip advised that she had again spoken to Bedfordia about the availability of a plot of land for allotments with no success because of the potential legal issues; she had also spoken to the previous owners of The Maltings who still own the land at the back of The Maltings. They do not wish to consider just now the possibility of “hosting” the allotments on that land. Concern and disappointment were expressed over Bedfordia’s position – it was thought that proper provision could be made to obviate the legal problems. To explore this idea further, Cllr Atkinson will invite David Empson from Kempston, who has expertise in land acquisition, to a future meeting. Cllr Atkinson will also contact resident Monica Robinson to explore the idea of using glebe land. The possibility of using part of Riverside Meadow was again mooted but with so much agricultural land around it seems a pity to reduce the even now small amount of public amenity land. The plot of land at the top of the playing field was also suggested but it was felt that Bedfordia could legitimately resist offering this.

Cllr Sharman’s confirmed that his louvred light reducing device has been taken by the bollard manufacturers but that there had been no response from them (the manufacturers!) yet.

Cllr Inskip noted the new bollards in Thurleigh Road and asked about more on the grass verge. The clerk will clarify the situation with Borough Cllr McMurdo.

Cllr Snowball indicated he had had complaints about nuisance calls (doors being knocked and the caller running away). He further noted that benches on the playing field were being moved and surrounded by discarded food wrappers clearly purchased from the Garden Centre. And this follows the dog mess being left at numerous places around the village and household waste being dumped at the entrance to the playing field. All this extra work for somebody (and never the culprits, of course!) and it’s all so unnecessary! Hopefully you feel as angry about it as the Council and will do all you can to get it stopped. Nobody wants to see people prosecuted but I am sure they want the village desecrated even less.

It was noted that permission had been granted to develop “Bob’s shop” with certain minor conditions. The failure of the Planning Dept to note the comments offered by this Council was regretted and an explanation will be sought. (Subsequently, it has been confirmed that the email in question had for some reason gone into their spam file and not retrieved by their normal procedures). It has been noted that the demolition is proceeding brick-by-brick and the bricks being cleaned and treated with respect which seems at odds with the developers assertion that the bricks have deteriorated too much for re-use. This is to be communicated to the Planners.

And finally, at the very end of the meeting, after around 15 years as a Parish Councillor, 8 of those as Chairman, Cllr Inskip announced her immediate resignation to prepare for her new prestigious role within the county. She will be a hard act to follow but somebody will have to do it. Her contribution to the village was recognized by a small token from other councillors. By the time you read this, we should have identified her replacement as a councillor, hopefully in time for the May meeting.

The next meeting will be the Annual Meeting of Milton Ernest Parish Council on Thursday 3rd May in the Village Hall at 7.30pm. Agendas will be posted on all village notice boards and on the web-site before the meeting.