Secretary: Mike Rooke, Sycamore Mount, Higher Arthurs, Greenfield, OL3 7BE

February ‘05

Dear Everyone,

Open to all Greenfield and Grasscroft residents, our next meeting is on Tuesday March 15th ’05 at 7.30 p.m. at the King Bill, Chew Valley Road, Greenfield.

AGENDA

Minutes of our last meeting held on Feb 14 ‘05

Present: Mr and Mrs Andrews, George Bennett, Mavis Bingley, Edith and Mike Howarth, Tony Holmes, Wilf Hulme, Neil Langton, David Makin, Kathleen and David McNeeney, Eddie Nolan, Mike Rooke.

Apologies: Adele Baxter, Trevor Baxter, Christine Bennett, Carl and Mary Henson, Des O’Brien.

The Chair apologised for the change of date and time, due to half-term commitments and the King Bill Quiz Night later. He also welcomed new-attenders, extending this greeting to David Makin, an observer/visitor from Dobcross Residents Association.

After one amendment, deleting reference to GGRA’s recommendation to Dominic Wall to set up a pressure group against a supermarket, our January minutes were read and accepted as a true record.

1. Matters Arising

	The Prune Hill Car park application has been successful. Including monies from Oldham ’s Road Transport Plan, a total of £3k will be spent on refurbishing the site. Arrangements have been make to meet Sean Madden and Steve Smith from OMBC’s Park Dept at 2.0 p.m. on Feb 28 th.
	Mike has not yet been able find out anything more about an application by Phil Wiggett for drive widening to Marion’s Field off the A365.
	After almost a month’s delay and several phone calls to the GMCVO office, GGRA has found out that our Broadband bid to the N. West Regional Dev. Fund has not been successful. We seem to have been the victim of the criteria being changed to suit the fund holders during the selection process. Though we’d been told it was a “very good” application, it missed out on 3 key factors: a). Security and access to equipment, b). Too diverse a focus and c). Sustainability, because as a small organisation we do not have large reserves. Only 2 bids had so far succeeded, a fact that seems odd, given that the whole point of this initiative was to spread the use of broadband technology. Mike will report back to our nest meeting, once we’d received written confirmation.
	We’ve had no reply yet from Phil Woolas re. our request to change planning law to include health and educational factors.
	David had not yet received a reply from Gail Richards – Man. Dir, if Oldham’s Primary Health Care Trust
	David has now received an apology from the Highways Department signed by Mr Tony Nobblett for the erroneous statement on Gritting.
	David had not received an apology from Councillor Sutclliffe who had required his employee Cliff Jackson to indicate following one course of action re. road gritting whilst proceeding with another.
	Recycling - Mike had phoned Sue Jones (OMBC’s Recycling Officer) about a “rethink rubbish in Oldham” leaflet found on display at a borough venue which indicates that there are glass and tin recycling facilities at the Clarence in Greenfield. She apologised that a). This leaflet was out of date and b). That building development was now taking place on this site. However, we went on to discuss alternative sites for our area. Mike argued that the car park at Churchill Playing Fields was already being used for Xmas Tree mulching. Sue was grateful for this suggestion and would look into the idea.
	A letter has been sent to Malcolm Simister (OMBC – Head of Property Services) re. 14, Mossley Rd, Grasscroft.
	Following sewage problems reported by United Utilities, it was confirmed at January’s Area Committee Meeting that the skateboard park is now to be re-sited at a more central position on Churchill Playing Fields.
	A letter to Dean Clapworthy (OMBC Planning Officer) has been sent from GGRA on behalf of residents at Chew Vale re. the PFI development.
	We have joined Oldham Voluntary Action, as a voluntary body and Mike attended the Portal Web-site training session held on 26 th January.
	Following an Oldham Chron. January news item re. lorries, George was unhappy about the principle of GGRA members speaking to the press without decisions having already been made in committee. However, it was confirmed that all of us at last month’s meeting were against the increase of heavy lorries in the village.

2. Correspondence and Communications

	We had received 2 circular letters re. the UDP a). From Stephen Ramsden, the Programme Officer, with a schedule of the Inquiry and minutes of the Pre-Inquiry Meeting. And b). From Sarah Barker referring us to the Further Pre-Inquiry changes in the housing appendices of the draft UDP (available in Uppermill Library). The deadline for responses is March 7 th. (George agreed to look into this to check no changes had been made to aspects of the plan relating to our area on which we’d previously commented.
	Mike had sent a letter to C’llor Hughie McDonald (Chair of Education and Cultural Services), supporting the Parish Council’s bid to save Delph Library in solidarity with our co-Saddleworth villagers.
	A letter had been sent to Greater Manchester’s Community Foundation explaining that money to publicise our new web-site had not yet been spent because of the delays/uncertainties re. broadband. We received a reply asking us to keep them informed.
	We submitted our Free Membership Form to join Voluntary Action Oldham.

3. Treasurer’s Report

Our present balance is£722.97 including £15.00 cash in hand. Many thanks to Mrs Hairsine who paid her sub this month. Presently we have 18 paid members for this year.

It was agreed that our year’s financial end should be June 30 th.

4. Policing Issues

Having first encountered difficulty making phone contact through the GM Police’s central number, Mike H. had discovered that our new Saddleworth Police Station doesn’t function at lunchtime (a feast which varies widely with no set time!). When he called in at 2.35 p.m., a notice on the door stated that the Station would close "today at 2.30pm", implying for the day, not lunch, though Mike H. was informed by reception that it was ‘ probably’ for lunch. He and Edith then met Rachel and Dennis, the new Community Police Officers (CPO’s) for our area for an initial meeting. It was claimed by the CPO’s that actions taken had already improved school kids’ behaviour on local buses. The Howarths, along with Mavis Bingley, were seeking a future meeting to discuss policing issues and the CPO’s role in more detail. The meeting felt it would be a good idea to invite the CPO’s to one of our meetings, so a range of questions could be put to them, though Mike was asked to invite Inspector England along first of all to find out his policy re. CPO’s deployment.

5. PFI Developments

To enhance the effectiveness of our lobbying, David presented an advice sheet for stakeholders affected by PFI Renewal Schemes. It was important that a range of factors be considered in order to stop the developers at Wood Square and Chew Vale railroading through their proposals without due attention being given to community interests. Given how badly these PFI developments had been handled by the developers and OMBC officials, there was a good chance of achieving a delay in proceedings so all the issues could be considered.

Neil Langton and Wilf Hulme described the history of the Wood Square scheme proposals, alluding to the obduracy of officials. OMBC and Housing 21 appeared not to be listening. Strenuous efforts had been made to present alternatives, expressing disquiet about doubling housing density on the site to build 9 extra private flats, about parking and access issues etc, but no substantive changes had been made to the original plans.

As all existing walkways had been obliterated in the plans, Neil/Wilf were going to obtain Evidence of Use forms from OMBC Footpaths and would be submitting these via Mr Cavanagh, the Footpaths Officer.

A sub-committee of the Overview and Scrutiny Commission was being convened on Wed 16 th Feb, with councillors and MP’s to look at the progress of OMBC’s PFI schemes. David said he would be attending this meeting and would argue for a delay so all stakeholders could be consulted properly. At Wood Square , there was a wide range of people in the Carr Lane estate who presently hadn’t been given a say.

It was agreed that GGRA send a letter on behalf of the community to Andy McMullen, the planning officer. (see attached – e- mail network). Though residents receiving letters had been given a deadline of Feb 15 th to respond (the day after this meeting), Mr McMullen had assured Mike we now had till 23 rd Feb (i.e. 21 days after publication of the planning notice in the Chron). Mike would remind Mr McMullen of this at the top of our letter, sending copies to Phil Woolas and local councillors.

In the case of Chew Vale, David reported that the security fencing had been reduced and a barrier added to the entrance to the car park.

6. Web-site Update

Now that it appeared that we wouldn’t be getting Broadband access in the immediate future we agreed to proceed as quickly as possible to set up the present web-site as much of the copy for ggra.co.uk was now in place on a temporary site. Mike will liase with the Voluntary Action, Oldham and Anthony Chiu to get things moving. He’ll also speak with Peter Fox to discuss an archiving and whether it may be possible to store equipment at the Museum giving more public access to the whole project.

7. Any Other Business

	Mike Howarth said that the pavement access up to the new building site on Friezland Lane had been built too wide, so that construction lorries had damaged the banking on the opposite side of the narrower road. He’d raised objections with the Enforcement team.
	Mr and Mrs Andrews were writing to the Enforcement Team about the height of the new Friezland Lane houses, a height disproportionate to each dwelling’s small land space and higher than shown on the plans. The Chair asked if a copy of this letter could be sent to our secretary.
	In view of communication and courtesy problems encountered by residents when trying to contact OMBC at Reception etc, Mike was asked to write to Andrew Kilburn, the Chief Executive, on this issue.
	Mike R., David, Mike H. and Edith had all attended the pro-Saddleworth Meeting held at the Civic Hall on Feb 1 st. In view of the wide range of opinions expressed that evening, it was felt that the meeting was well conducted by the Chair, David Makin. It was regrettable however, that one political party had chosen to use the event as a platform for their own agenda. Mike said the idea proposed by Alan Roughley of setting up a South Pennine Authority had not been reported in the Chron. In a future review of local authorities, it seemed likely that the government will be opting to expand Manchester City Council, taking over areas of Oldham . In this case, given that OMBC is viewed as a failing council, it is likely that Oldham might merge with neighbours Rochdale and/or Tameside. The South Pennine Authority would comprise of all those outlying districts on the fringe of urban authorities – e.g. Holmfirth area, Hebden Bridge , Littleborough and Saddleworth. Contact is to be made with these areas to assess the extent of support for such a project.

For past minutes, please visit the minutes archive.