To be made available on conservation.ecclesfieldgroups.com [Version dated 2019-01-22 by JP]

Agenda for the Conservation meeting of
2019-01-22 at 19:00 in “The Stocks”

C.    Chair: RT.

D.    Agenda Items

  1. Whether members want to publicise, the “short term” nature of the Environment Agency’s decision not to reduce penalties for exceeding emission limits (See following section).

  2. Whether to press the SCC to consider applying for a Government Grant to improve or protect the old co-op building or anything else on Ecclesfield High Street (See following section).

  3. Whether to comment on the Government’s proposals for “Street Trees”.

X.    Any Planning Concerns. See the penultimate section.

Y.    Any questions or comments on the “Emails received”, “Information watch”, or “Issues remaining”. sections below; or any other business.

Z.     To confirm or change the next meeting date of 26th of Feb.

On the Agenda Items

1. The Environment Agency, has published a summary of our objections and decided “not to take forward” their proposal to consolidate scores for multiple infringements, and suspend penalties for multiple periods. We were concerned that this would reduce the penalties, should - for instance - emissions from Starnhill Close exceed their limits. However the EA say it is withdrawn “in the short term”. I don’t therefore know whether it is better to let the issue fall away like a neglected planning application; try to increase public awareness; or see if the Frack Free community will take it on.

2. The government is inviting local authorities to apply for grants for the High Street. These include a total of £55 million “… to restore historic high street properties for new work spaces or cultural venues. and put them to use.” I wondered if we should suggest that if the Shields Estate Agency insist on leaving 62, 64, 66 High Street, the SCC apply for a grant to renovate the building). The first item in Information Watch might become relevant to this.

3. The Government is consulting on the protection of street trees. I don’t know which way we would want to answer it, but one of the sections asks “whether there should a duty for local authorities to consult on the felling of street trees?”.


The items in the next few sections will not be gone through one by one, but can be discussed in any other business if any member wishes to bring them up.

Communications, e.g. on ecclesfield.conservation@gmail.com.

Information watch



Issues completed

Outstanding issues

If any members can help, or want to bring any of the following up for any other reason, they can do so in any other business.

*      We have a baseline figure for the radioactivity in Blackburn brook, ready to check for any increase, whether due to fracking or any other discharges. However, it occurred to me recently that if anybody can suggest a suitable access point, a measurement upstream of FCC environmental might also be useful.
* I have been experimenting with, but am still not happy with the more secure website at https://ecclesfieldgroups.co.uk/ If anybody has any comments on doing something similar with, or any other aspects of our website, just let me know.
*    Designs for the pop-up, and horizontal banners are still in progress.
*      We have a fireproof trunk for storing archive material. Members might prefer a more generally accessible location if one can be found [As well as perhaps other things such as our Gazebo].
*      We still have plans to survey major trees within the Conservation Area.
*      Sheffield City Council’s alcohol licensing system is still not on-line. This not only makes it difficult for anybody to find out what restrictions apply to any licenses granted in the past, but we may be missing some of their new decisions, since we can only see the latest (2 week?) decisions.

New planning applications

The following planning applications and appeals were found by searching for Ward = “East Ecclesfield”, Parish = Ecclesfield Parish Council”, postcodes S35 9?? and S35 1TE, validated from 13th Nov 2018 to 20th Jan 2019. [You may be able to click on the underlined links, and then the [Documents] tab to see the drawings etc. Otherwise, just go to planningapps.sheffield.gov.uk/online-applications/, then enter the “Ref. No” for the application you are interested in.
The contents of brackets and italics are my interpretation - made after briefly scanning some of the planning documents]

Still pending

The next SCC Planning Committee meeting does not list any “Ecclesfield” applications, but the agenda for 19 February does not seem to have been decided. Anybody concerned about one of the applications could check this later at democracy.sheffield.gov.uk/ieListMeetings.aspx?CommitteeId=373 .

Decided

Alcohol Licensing