CHARLESTOWN, LIMEKILNS AND PATTIESMUIR COMMUNITY COUNCIL MINUTES OF MEETING HELD AT THE BRUCE ARMS ON 22.2.11 Present: Sue Hamilton, Annie Nally, Beryl Leatherland, Lyndsy Adam, Lesley Scott, Suze Anderson, In attendance: Gordon McKissock, Bill McKissock, Mike Graham, Polly Cleall-Harding, Ian Cruikshanks, Russell Kelly, Kirit Rach, Jim Tolson MSP (until 8.30pm), Derek Abbott (Ranger) 1. Apologies: Lyndsy (for being late after attending a Neighbourhood Watch meeting for us in Cairneyhill) Peter Curry, Graham Urquhart, Ali MacKerron, Kat Tebbutt, Cllr Walker, Lisa Lewry, Christine Page. 2. Welcome: In the Chairman’s absence, Beryl took the chair and welcomed everyone to the meeting 3. Minutes of the meeting of 25th January 2011. These were approved as a true record. Suze approved, Beryl seconded. 4. Matters Arising from Meeting of 25th January 2011 a) Area behind the Manse. Lyndsy is to speak to Ed Dunbar, to explain Playgroup’s perspective again. b) ‘Window’ in Mort House at Rosyth cemetery is still to be repaired. Liz Murphy is on the case. c) Lyndsy has drafted a letter to Pattiesmuir residents inviting interested folk to get in touch to fill a place d) Sam Burton has indicated that she’s too busy to fill the other vacancy on the Community Council. e) Still awaiting the installation of the ‘Comfort Break’ WC sign by Fife Council. Ian says it is supposed to be done this week. f) Surgery Issues. Stewart Anderson has been contacted about the continuing problem with bright lights coming on at odd times of the night. Bins: We hope it is now fixed that the blue bin will be pu tout beside the bin store on a Friday for collection on a Sunday. The yellow bin will not be put out until Monday morning. g) Red Telephone Box. Secretary still hopes to discover who it was who was interested in converting the Charlestown box into a mini-heritage information centre. h) Scott Blyth had produced a large scale map for us to mark prohibited and advisory parking places. Lyndsy will draw up proposals for discussion. i) West Fife Villages Booklet. We had been left out because we didn’t happen to be at the WFCCF meeting when they discussed who was going to update which bit! j) Buckshot. Ryan had contacted the Procurator Fiscal to establish where responsibility lay for potential injury. k) Royal Mail. Secretary had written to Consumer Focus who had elicited a proper response from Royal Mail, who said that all should have settled down by now. Secretary had asked Jane if this was the case, and she said that things were now working out. They were getting mail delivered to both villages every day, and their van was taking some of the strain. l) Main Street Lighting. Secretary had written to John Anderson requesting that we be put on the list. m) Submarine dismantling. Secretary had written to the signatories of the two letters received, one from Bath and one from Mike Pettigrew, to enquire when the ‘Local Liaison Committee’ which had been mentioned, had last met, and who the members were. She had received a very vague answer to both questions from …David McGinley! Jim Tolson explained that there were two general options for dismantling submarines. Both involve cutting off the bow and stern sections and disposing of them through normal steel recycling routes. Thereafter, the central section which had housed the reactor and associated pipe work, would, in one scenario, be left intact and placed in an, as yet unspecified, long term nuclear waste store. The other option would involve dismantling the central section into component parts to reduce the volume of contaminated hardware requiring to be stored. Submarines currently stored afloat in Rosyth, are visually inspected by divers on a regular basis. Each one is removed to dry dock every 12 years for scraping and repainting, before being returned to afloat storage. The hole that had appeared in one of the submarines had been in one of the ballast tanks which are made of thinner steel than the hull of the submarine itself. n) Charles Court pavement. The pavement outside numbers 1 to 4 Charles Court has been replaced with proper tarmac. The Secretary had complained about the poor quality of the black sealant, not because she had wanted the pavement replaced, but because she had thought the information might be of use to Fife Council in future appointment of contractors!
o) Proposed ‘gateway’ treatment at Limekilns Road, Dunfermline. Secretary had written, saying that the general consensus was that this was hardly necessary, as no-one was aware of a speeding problem at this location. Iain Henderson had replied saying that ‘from a comprehensive speed survey the average recorded speed was 32.4 mph and the 85% percentile (speed which is not exceeded by 85% of drivers) was 38.4 mph’. p) Burning tyres at the Soapworks. SEPA had contacted the Estate about the incident. Rather than just speaking to the obvious culprit, the Estate had written to all the tenants of the garages warning them not to burn tyres! 5. Police a) Lyndsy had attended a meeting this evening in Cairneyhill to hear what might be involved in reestablishing a Neighbourhood Watch Scheme in the villages. Ryan will give us a pack of information about ‘Rejuvenating your Neighbourhood Watch Scheme’. b) Police will carry out free household security checks by request for over 60s. If they think you need minor bits of hardware such as door chains they can be installed for free. c) You can phone them up to let them know you are on holiday and they will keep an eye out for anything untoward. d) If you are going on holiday you can, apparently, get a temporary intruder alarm that will ring your mobile phone if it goes off. 6. Village Floral Displays Lyndsy had met Keith Jackson and shown him the locations where floral displays were planned. He was very helpful. They agreed to go for modest number of locations in this first year. There would be a BACS transfer to the Community Council account representing set-up grants for both Charlestown and Limekilns. 7. Proposed Western Extension of Fife Coastal Path. Derek Abbott, the local Ranger, spoke with enthusiasm about the importance of the Fife Coastal Path. The western extension to Kincardine, which is now being incorporated, will use road routes to get round the industrial areas at Rosyth and Crombie. Cllr McMullan suggested that there may be an opportunity for a path around the Crombie Depot boundary in the not too distant future. He will speak to Derek about this. Apart from stickers on lamp posts, the main impact in the villages will be an information board on Limekilns Pier. This will be of the standard design that is used all round Fife, with some nuggets of local information. Derek would show us what was planned before the board was made. 8. Planning a) 7 Main Street. Community Councillors had been shocked to discover that a planning officer had now written a different report to submit to the south west area committee this month, saying that the application should be rejected because it was ‘out of character with the Conservation Area’ and it would have an ‘adverse impact on the alleged right of way’. This totally contradicts the earlier recommendation for approval which Councillors had ignored last month, The Community Council agreed to send an email to Councillors this evening saying ‘We understood that a Fife planning officer had explained to Councillors at a site meeting the reasons why he would make a recommendation for approval. Members then chose to vote against approval and presumably, therefore, in favour of the very occasional potential users of the path, rather than in favour of the owners of the property who were making a legitimate and reasonable planning application. We are concerned that planning officers have now been told to go and find reasons to justify the decision by Councillors to refuse the application. We respectfully ask that you, as Councillors, revisit your decision and reject the report presented to you at tomorrow’s meeting of the South West Area Committee’. (We have since learnt that there was a unanimous vote in favour of new report to reject the application! Gerry had not been in attendance.) b) Hope Cottage. Mike Graham explained his plans and hopes for Hope Cottage. He had done a lot of preliminary work and research, including discussing the project with immediate neighbours. They all seemed to be in favour of the project despite a few misgivings about parking. The building is damp and in a poor state of repair, and has not been occupied for most of the past five years. The Community Council agreed to write a letter of support for the development, welcoming a new business that could be tastefully incorporated into our villages.
9. Parking at Queen Margaret Hospital Parking at Queen Margaret Hospital. Bellyeoman Community Council is seriously exercised by parking problems associated with the hospital. The general gist of their letter is that, rather than just putting up with the situation, people should put in more formal complaints, since managers suggest that the number of complaints is negligible. 10. Proposed Container Terminal The Community Council delivered a leaflet to all villagers, suggesting that they might wish to object, and supplying a list of reasons why the Community Council, as a result of extensive and detailed research, concluded that the proposal would be a thoroughly bad idea for our community. Moreover, it would be likely to generate only some 20 jobs rather than the 200 promised, while causing devastation to both wildlife and residents as well as threatening the integrity of our beaches and sea defenses. The Community Council is submitting a strong objection. 11. Treasurer's Report a) Current Account: £382.41 (4p interest!), Dunfermline Building Society: £2501.50 b) Invoice for £56 Balgownie Cards for printing leaflet. c) Secretary’s expenses to submit d) ASCC subscription of £15 due. e) Data Protection annual fee £35 due 12. Secretary's Report a) Tom Minogue is campaigning assiduously on the issue of ‘Common Good’ assets. These are the various buildings, artifacts, pieces of land, and pots of money that have been bequeathed historically and accumulated by local authorities, and details of which often ‘disappear’ as authorities are absorbed and combined. Common Good assets belong to the people of the particular area, not to the Council. b) Fife Council has offered induction training for new Community Councillors during the daytime. c) Fife Council is looking for a member of the public to serve on the Licensing Board. d) APRS newsletter e) ASCC newsletter f) Fit’n’Fun in Fife g) Letter from West Fife Rotary Club asking if we knew of any projects which might appreciate assistance from Rotary. College Club are looking for new chairs. h) Cllr Walker had asked if he could attend a Community Council meeting in his role as SNP Prospective MSP. Secretary had not replied. We don’t do politics. i) Telephone Exchange Wall. On Monday in the late afternoon Secretary received a call from Richard Weir who had at around lunchtime, along with someone else, witnessed a BT vehicle reversing into the wall at the Telephone Exchange and making it unsafe. A barrier had now been erected which is blocking the pavement j) Toilets. Toilets have been closed since the icy weather as they again suffered from burst pipes. Ron Farn, of Fife Council has promised to get them repaired, even though he believes that Fife Council will close them down because of the cuts. 13. Councillor’s Report Nothing that has not been raised already 14. AOCB 15. Date of Next Meeting
Tuesday 29th March 2011 at the Bruce Arms.