Minutes for Homerton Neighbourhood Forum meeting, Sep 22 2009, 7.00PM official page

Councillor Nkafu welcomed everyone to the meeting and explained that he would be chairing the meeting as Councillor Taylor was attending a meeting at the Olympic Delivery Authority. 

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Taylor, Boyd and Akehurst and co-opted members Rev Wickham and Paul Smith.

The Chair stated that Councillor Akehurst was now out of hospital but was still not well enough to attend this meeting.

Stuart Maxwell, co-opted member declared a personal interest in agenda item 8 Hackney LINk – Health and Social Care Ser vices in Hackney, as he was a member of Hackney LINk and a Governor of the East London Foundation Trust.

To note the resignation of the Co-opted member Kevin Thompson.

The Chair announced the resignation of Kevin Thompson, co-opted member of the forum, due to health reasons. 

The minutes of the meeting held on 15 July 2009 were agreed as an accurate record of the proceedings subject to the following amendments:

That Councillor Kemp was at the meeting and apologies for lateness should have been reported for Councillor Patrick.

Matters Arising/Actions from the last meeting

5.1  Agenda item 8.2 Housing Policy (Land at the Corner of the Tryon Crescent and Primrose Square E9)

Ian Williams, Director of Finance and Resources stated that Councillor Taylor had a number of questions with regard to the response for this issue that Ian Williams would respond to and follow up on at the next meeting.

ACTION IAN WILLIAMS

5.2  Agenda item 8.3 Employment of Local People on the Olympic Site

Ian Williams stated that from January 09 the Olympic Delivery Authority no longer produced a borough by borough breakdown of workers at the Olympic site. However he reported:

In July 2009 total number of people employed by contractors on site was 4434. The total number of people resident in the 5 host boroughs was 866 (20% of total work force)

  The borough breakdown (latest figures January 2009)

  Total number of people employed by contractors on site – 3315

Number of people resident in the 5 host boroughs – 751 (23% of total workforce)

  Hackney – 99 (3%)

  Waltham Forest – 160 (5%)

  Newham -275 (8%)

  Tower Hamlets – 90 (3%)

  Greenwich – 127 (4%)

5.3  Agenda item 9 Well Street Common Premises Licence

In reply to a question from Stuart Maxwell, co-opted member, Councillor Katie Hanson confirmed that a large number of objections had been raised opposing the Licence for Well Street Common, the views of which the Licensing Sub-Committee had taken into consideration when making the decision to refuse the Licence.

5.4  Agenda item 10 Issues on the Kingsmead Estate.

In reply to a question raised by Stuart Maxwell the Chair confirmed that a letter from Santuary Hereward Housing had been received.  The letter apologised for their member of staff leaving the last meeting of the forum before the item was discuss.  The Chair also confirmed that all of the issues raised at the meeting had been taken up by the ward Councillors and had either been resolved or were being looked into.

Phillip Burns, Interim Operations Manager, confirmed that in accordance with residents request at a previous meeting of the forum a parking stress survey had been carried out in Gore Road and surrounding roads on 9^th and 11^th June 2009.  The results of which were made available at the meeting and can be obtained, upon request, from Democratic Services. 

Philip Burns explained the methodology used during a parking stress survey. Visits were made twice in the day between 6am and 7am and 12pm and 2pm.  Parked vehicles were counted and what should be occupancy levels were compared with the actual occupancy levels in the road.  The results of the parking stress survey had shown that the level of parking stress was 84% leaving parking spaces of 16%.  This amount of parking stress was not significantly high enough for officers to recommend a controlled parking zone in this area.  Residents disputed the officers’ findings and stated that they were intending to complain to the Council with regard to the methodology used for the parking stress survey.  In reply to residents questions’ Phillip Burns confirmed that vehicle spacing size used as recommended by the Department of Transport was 5.3 metres.  He agreed that another parking stress survey could be carried out next year around June 2010.

Councillor Hanson suggested that officers meet with residents to discuss the survey and the methodology used.  Phillip Burns stated that if residents requested he could send them a copy of the report with regard to the survey and then meet with residents to discuss the data that had been produced. 

The Chair thanked Phillip Burns for attending the meeting and proposed that if the residents required any further information they should contact either Phillip Burns or their ward councillor.

Butta Singh, Licensing Legal Officer, read out the presentation slides as attached to the agenda and asked for any ideas from attendees with regard to this act.  He apologised to the meeting for not having any detailed information on how the Sustainable Communities Act affected betting shops in the area as detailed on the agenda. Stuart Maxwell expressed his disappointment in this information not being provided at the meeting as the pre agenda group had specifically asked for it.  The Chair proposed that this information would be made available for the next meeting and that it included a progress update on the proposal which had been forwarded to the Local Government Association.  Councillor Lloyd also suggested that it would be helpful if Councillor Linden be invited to the next meeting to discuss the issue of the Sustainable Communities Act more fully.

ACTION: BUTTA SINGH/DEMOCRATIC SERVICES

Councillor Hanson stated that Hackney was currently more advanced with the types of things this Act allowed the Council to do than a lot of other Local Authorities.  She confirmed that for planning purposes betting shops were in the same class as Banks, Estate and Travel Agents and therefore betting shops did not have to apply for planning permission if the premises they were taking over had been one of these businesses.  It was hoped that this Act would allow the Council to adopt a betting shop policy similar to the policy restricting licensed premises in Shoreditch.

The following proposals for consideration were put forward:

Councillor Siddiqui called for the street markets in the Borough to be protected. 

Pat Turnbull suggested

• The proposed extension of the Tesco development in Morning Lane
• More social rented housing in the Borough

In reply to a question from Councillor Stops, Butta Singh stated that he was not aware of any other Local Authorities that had used this Act to protect public houses. 

The Chair thanked Butta Singh for attending the meeting.

Esther Norman, Support and Development Manager of Hackney LINk, stated that Hackney LINk was a local involvement network for Hackney.  Every local authority in England had a LINk .  They had been set up by the government to enable local people to monitor, influence or change the way their local National Health Service and Social Care Services were planned, developed and delivered.  Hackney LINk had been founded in 2008 and launched in May 2009.  It had elected a steering group of 13 members all of which were Hackney Residents.

Hackney LINk would collect residents’ views and feed them onto the decision makers.  They had the power to visit and assess health and social care services; to refer concerns/issues raised by the public to the Health in Hackney Scrutiny Commission and the Care Quality Commission and expect responses from the appropriate authority within 20 working days. 

Currently Hackney LINk was going though the process of collecting issues and prioritising them appropriately.  Esher Norman encouraged local residents to join Hackney LINk; details of which could be obtained from www.hackneylink.org.uk

In reply to a question from Paul Higgins, co-opted member, Esher Norman confirmed that there was a City LINk and that Hackney LINk would be working very closely with them, especially with regard to the Primary Care Trust that had services that covered both areas.

a.  Street Cleaning

In reply to a question from Stuart Maxwell, Councillor Laing stated that the motorised street cleaning machines were in operation during the day, including peak times, to ensure that the streets of Hackney were kept clean.  He also confirmed that staff did have brooms and rakes for cleaning leaves as well as the leave blowers but that they were more time consuming for staff to use and therefore less efficient.

b.  Motorised street cleaning machines and other Council vehicles breaking paving stone

In reply to a question from a resident Councillor Laing confirmed that motorised street cleaning machines and other Council vehicles  should not be breaking paving stones and that this issue was being looked into.

c.  Future agenda items

A resident asked if a future agenda item could be on youth work that the Council carried out in the Borough.

ACTION: DEMOCRATIC SERVICES

d.  Events going on in the Borough

Councillor Jessica Webb brought the attention of residents at the meeting to two events that were to be held the weekend following this meeting;

·  Hackney Wick Festival would be held on Saturday 26 September 2009 and

·  The Hackney Carnival would be held on Sunday 27 September 2009.

Future meetings will be held on:

14 January 2010

24 March 2010

The venues for which to be confirmed.

Future meetings would be held on 14 January 2010 and 24 March 2010, venues for which were to be confirmed.