----- Original Message ----- From: "Clive Hart" <clive.hart@btinternet.com>
To: "cllr-Robert Bayford" <cllr-Robert.Bayford@thanet.
Sent: Tuesday, August 10, 2010 2:43 PM
Subject: Re: AN OPEN COMMUNICATION TO THE LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION, TDC
Cllr Bayford
I asked three simple questions concerning your Cabinet's decision to gift away the green at Dalby Square - they were:
1) Why were the valiant efforts and more importantly the serious concerns of a local residents group simply airbrushed out of a report and how can TDC now assure other groups across the district that they are being listened to and taken seriously?
2) How can people here in Thanet have any confidence in the TDC Asset Disposal public consultation process if such significant changes as the removal of a 700 sq mtr green space can occur AFTER the consultation process has been completed?
3) How can the people of Thanet trust a council that says one thing and does the absolute opposite?
I'm very sorry but you dealt with none of these questions anywhere near adequately in your response.
Your comment regarding any reservations I may have had is simply ridiculous. After seven years of making my/our position absolutely clear, if you still didn't know how we ward councillors and our residents felt about the green space then quite frankly you were the only person at TDC (and probably in Thanet) who didn't.
I welcome regeneration in our ward or any other, but not at the expense of community green space in such a densely populated area with so many inherent problems that particular situation brings with it.
Cllr Clive Hart
PS - You may consider a 1,300 sq mtr green area to be 'a patch of grass' but I think you'll find almost anyone else in Thanet would refer to such an area as a large open green space, and if anyone is being disingenuous it is a council leader who allows such a one-sided report to come to his own cabinet which totally ignores a residents group that has raised around £400,000 to do the council's own work for them.
----- Original Message ----- From: "cllr-Robert Bayford" <cllr-Robert.Bayford@thanet.gov.uk>
To: "Clive Hart" <clive.hart@btinternet.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 10, 2010 11:10 AM
Subject: AN OPEN COMMUNICATION TO THE LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION, TDC
Cllr Hart,
Your open letter concerning Cabinet’s decision in respect of the
proposed new housing in Dalby Square is disappointing.
Anyone present at the meeting will know that all the issues raised by
you and your colleagues were comprehensively answered. Furthermore, the
documents you produced for dramatic effect were shown to be minutes of
decisions from 2003, which were subsequently superseded, and it was
explained that a sketch of what a development on the site might look
like was not a definitive brief.
The fact is that the patch of grass you refer to was clearly designated
for housing in Thanet’s current local plan which was adopted in 2006.
It had been the object of a grant application to the Countryside Agency
to create a ‘doorstep green’ on the site but this failed. As ward
councillors, I would have thought that you and your colleagues should
have been aware of this but you quite clearly were not.
It is totally disingenuous of you to refer to the applicants, Town and
Country Housing, as ‘developers’. They are a housing association and
one of this council’s preferred partners and their proposed scheme
will provide high quality social housing which will complement the drive
to improve an area desperately in need of change.
Our gifting of the land for this project not only demonstrates the
importance that we attach to the regeneration of Cliftonville but also
allows for a better scheme, with more housing units, to come forward.
What is built on this site will be determined by TDC’s planning
committee and, as you should know, our planning process allows plenty of
opportunity for the public to make their views known. I have every
confidence that whatever scheme is ultimately approved, it will be the
best one for the area.
A regeneration scheme at the heart of your ward is something to be
welcomed with open arms. If you had any reservations about the proposals
coming forward, I would have expected you, as a responsible politician,
to have made your concerns known to me in private, so that we might have
been able to address these and present a united front at the public
Cabinet meeting. Your decision to treat this matter as a political
football is disappointing, although not surprising.
Cllr. Bob Bayford
Leader of the Council
Bob"Clive Hart" <clive.hart@btinternet.com> 06/08/2010 09:58 >>>
I would have preferred to keep these matters within the council but I'm
afraid the omissions in relation to information made available through
the report to cabinet regarding the green space at Dalby Square last
night were shocking and the public therefore needs to know the answers
to my questions below.
Regards
Clive
____________________________________________________________ _
AN OPEN COMMUNICATION TO THE THANET DISTRICT COUNCIL LEADER
Cllr Bayford
Last night, as a ward councillor and jointly with Cllr Linda Aldred and
Cllr Doug Clark, I/we argued against the proposed decision for Cabinet
to gift the current green space at Dalby Square to developers for them
to build on. Despite our very best efforts your cabinet decided to
completely ignore our pleas.
I therefore now write as Leader of the Opposition to outline the wider
implications of that Cabinet decision for Thanet District Council as a
whole.
Firstly, the residents group totally ignored by the Cabinet process has
been promoted by TDC over the past seven years as an exemplar community
partner, appearing in many TDC publications and in the press. Indeed,
your predecessor even took a Government Minister to the square to see
the group's sterling work. And quite rightly, the Dalby Square Group
have worked tirelessly for around a decade, raised almost £400,000 to do
what could actually be described as the council's own work for them, and
made an enormous difference to their community and our local
environment. As Cllr Lind Aldred quoted last night, your TDC community
involvement statement says "It is important that the community is
involved from the early stages".
So why were the valiant efforts and more importantly the serious
concerns of a local residents group simply airbrushed out of a report
and how can TDC now assure other groups across the district that they
are being listened to and taken seriously?
The TDC plans for Dalby Square drawn by TDC officers that went through
the TDC Asset Disposal Process in 2008 were completely ignored by you
and your colleagues when making last night's decision. A 700 sq mtr
green was clearly shown to residents and ward councillors as part of any
future development of the site during the Asset Disposal process. Last
night's decision will leave not one blade of grass or community space
for residents or visitors.
How can people here in Thanet have any confidence in the TDC Asset
Disposal public consultation process if such significant changes as the
removal of a 700 sq mtr green space can occur AFTER the consultation
process has been completed?
Last night Cllr Doug Clark explained that he had spoken to the
architect for the developer and asked him if he had been briefed by
planning of the concerns of the residents about saving the green area at
the south end of Dalby Square - his answer was that he had not. Only
three weeks ago full council at TDC agreed a KEY COMMITMENT to improving
quality use of open spaces and a KEY PROJECT to develop a targeted
programme for improving play facilities. Furthermore, in a recent press
release on the new garden development rules you said yourself "It is a
step that will transform our ability to prevent unwanted development and
gives us more power to protect our valuable green spaces".
How can the people of Thanet trust a council that says one thing and
does the absolute opposite?
Residents are also asking why the developers drop-in consultation took
place on one evening and the following evening TDC declared the square a
Conservation Area? And how can the land be 'gifted' to a developer by
cabinet AFTER a planning application has been received but before a
decision has been made and therefore during the application process? It
all sounds very shifty to residents and I have to say I can understand
why.
Thursday's appalling decision goes well beyond the green space, well
beyond Dalby Square and well beyond Cliftonville West. It has
ramifications for all the residents of our district here in Thanet
regarding their dealings with our local authority.
Cllr Clive Hart - Leader of the Opposition TDC.
Again Thanet councillors are to be viewed with "whats in it for them" somewhere down the line the whole crooked bunch sitting in the Kremlin will be found out, it may just be by having a road named after them, but i bet many will benefit personally from this and other plans which will go ahead and as mere residents we will be treated with the same arrogance as we have had for the past 20 years.
ReplyDeleteBob Bayford is hedging - of course housing associations are developers. We do not want more social housing it brings NOTHING to cliftonville especially not money, just unfortunately in most cases more people that us taxpayers are homing and keeping in booze, gigs, take aways and other luxuries that we have to budget for.
ReplyDeleteSocial housing is NOT regeneration its an excuse for the council to fill their pockets with cash from other councils for housing their ex offenders and misfits they want out of their area.
I appreciate that Clive hart has had the gumption to speak up too many decisions are made behind closed doors.
"I would have expected you, as a responsible politician,
ReplyDeleteto have made your concerns known to me in private, so that we might have been able to address these and present a united front at the public Cabinet meeting."
Councillors, you are SERVANTS of the public, and we are entitled to know all about your activities, even if you find that inconvenient. There should be no place for grubby deals in private. The comment by Cllr Bayford just serves to strengthen the contempt and cynicism that many of us have for you and your actions.
Dalby Square/Warren Court planning application
ReplyDeleteThis proposal is to build MORE SOCIAL HOUSING. So, although the size of flats and houses is bigger than the social housing MINIMUM standard, I'd prefer to see the site used for a better, high quality scheme eg a high quality hotel.
With The Turner Contemporary about to open in Spring 2011, Margate and Cliftonville is desperately short of decent hotel or B&B accommodation. Dalby Square has gracious architecture, and deserves better than more social housing. It’s also a unique conservation area being in Cliftonville’s only square – and having sea views and a Square that’s been regenerated by residents. So it would be an excellent location for a high quality hotel, which would attract high quality visitors into Cliftonville, and encourage them to spend in local shops and businesses. And, by the way, I still want the green space to be conserved, not built upon.
Stimpson House is already encountering problems, round the corner from Dalby Square. [I've heard that of the 140 flats built, none are now likely to be sold to private buyers.]
It seems madness to build yet more social housing in Cliftonville since that attracts more people who need social housing!!! If TDC is serious about correcting the problems of Cliftonville, now would be a great time to change tack, and therefore who it chooses to partner.