West Yorkshire Police - Community Consultation

West Yorkshire Police on the 4th January 2012 launched  a month-long consultation to establish how the county’s residents prefer to communicate with their local officers. The Force is seeking the views of residents to inform decisions regarding the way people will be able to report incidents and receive information in the future.


There is no mention of it on the local Burmantofts and Richmond Hill Neighbourhood Policing Website and COVEN certainly  have not been told of this consultation period by either our local NPT or any of our local councillors!

As we the residents of Burmantofts and Richmond Hill are not due either a PACT Meeting or Neighbourhood Forum meeting until after the consultation period is over, COVEN wish to bring this vital survey to the attention of local residents.  

The survey can be found here

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/public_contact     


Please take the time to complete it as we feel it is important to participate  - even if we weren't told of it in the first place !


COVEN are concerned that the survey seems to indicate the wish to close the local police help desks in an effort to reduce costs. As our local labour councillors are now campaigning in the area saying they are opposed to a reduction in the service that the West Yorkshire Police provide we can only hope they are true to their word.

Remember however that Ron Grahame (labour) was very vocal in his opposition of the closure of Gipton & Stanks Fire Stations and then voted at the fire authority to close them resulting in a significantly reduced service for our area and the loss of 24 full time fire fighter posts.

COVEN will post a report and timeline of Councillor Ron Grahames despicable behaviour shortly........watch this space.....

We are stating the New Year on a positive note

Those of you who live near or travel along the parade of shops at York Road towards the bus stops bound for town will have noticed there has been a really remarkable turnaround in the standards of street cleaning in this area recently.

COVEN spoke to the gentleman in charge of the street cleaning service at the last Inner East Area Committee meeting in December and pointed out the disgusting state of the pavements in this area particularly and asked for him, Mr John Woolmer, to look into the situation and see what could be done.  We are happy to say that Mr Woolmer and his staff have made herculean efforts recently and as a result the area is now no longer the smelly and shameful site it was.

COVEN has also asked about having rubbish bins placed near the take aways and off-licences on the parade and this is being looked into but as always finance is the sticking point on this, though we have great faith in Mr Woolmer doing all that can be done to procure these items to help the clean up stay clean.

The street cleaning staff are working very hard to keep the area clear of rubbish but it would help if those who live here did their own part and made sure that all rubbish is placed in bins (if and when we managed to get them installed) and not left to blow about the streets.

Another really disgusting problem in this area is the amount of dog mess on every available pavement, road, green space or playground.  This has been raised several times with our councillors, Street Cleaning and the dog wardens however the main problem again seems to be that there are not enough dog wardens to effectively police the whole city and there is no money to hire more but we intend to keep after everyone involved to see if this problem can at least be lessened if not eliminated.

If you have any problem or query that you would like COVEN to look into please email us at ls94ever@gmail.com and we will be happy to talk to you about it.

The proposed closure of Gipton & Stanks Fire Stations

Last night representatives of COVEN were present at a sparsely attended meeting at the Richmond Hill Community Centre to discuss the proposed closure of the fire stations at Stanks and Gipton which is to be replaced by a new build Fire Station at Killingbeck, but with reduced engine capacity.  All three of our ward councillors were there and though the meeting was small the representatives from the Fire Brigade found themselves with some very difficult questions to answer many of which they were unable to respond to and had on many occasions to say they didn’t know!

Steve Rhodes, Fire Service Area Manager who leads the risk management team, and Mick Smith, Group Manager and Leeds District Commander  set out the reasons for such a drastic cut in services in Leeds and surrounding areas stating they felt it could be done with the least overall impact to the communities affected.  Basically it was stated that the Government, who provide 60% of the funding of the fire services in Leeds, are implementing a 26% reduction to the budgets resulting in the need for these visceral cuts.

Gipton at present is an low cost efficient station with 2 engines covering a VERY HIGH risk area.  Stanks has 1 engine covering a medium risk area; it is proposed the new fire station would be placed at Killingbeck and have 2 engines.  Steve Rhodes stated that because the Fire Service has not had any money to recruit and train new fire fighters since 2009 they now did not have enough personnel to staff  as many engines as they have now, even if they did not have the 26% cut and this situation will only get worse in the future.

Many points were raised at the meeting but amongst them was an increase in response times for some parts of Burmantofts and Richmond Hill Wards due to moving the fire station further away – it was admitted that these would increase but the Fire Service felt they would still be acceptable, COVEN however were less convinced. 

Sarah from COVEN took the officers through their business plan point by point and exposed what we certainly feel are the key weaknesses not least being that areas of highest need will end up with less cover, and whilst COVEN can see that certain circumstances such as fire resistant building materials and furnishings may have made some households safer this is not the case for most of the housing stock in Richmond Hill.  We also acknowledge the excellent work the Fire Service itself has done in providing free Fire Safety Checks however it cannot be denied that some areas such as ours, topping as we do the Indices of Deprivation for the city, and with 2 major roads running through the ward needs more support than the leafy and by and large safer suburbs.  Much of our housing stock was built in the late 1800’s to middle 1930’s when building codes were not as strict as today on fire proof materials or design.

Susan  of COVEN pointed out that no one knows how many people actually live in our area, many houses have been converted into houses of multiple- occupation without any fire checks and this together with the age of the housing stock; its tightly packed nature and very transient and deprived population means that the good work of the fire service is often undone in less than 3 months by the endless rotation of tenants.  The officers were asked if there was a set number of engines to be provided by head of population but apparently there isn’t.

Sarah of COVEN  suggested that since the main driver behind this move was cost it would surely be better retain and re-furbish the Gipton fire station pointing out it has already the facilities that were proposed for the new fire station and if the extra 2 minutes + would not be detrimental to Richmond Hill, an area of VERY HIGH risk it could surely not be excessive what applied to the Stanks area which is a medium risk station.  The officers did agree that this could be one of the options open to them, albeit reluctantly.

Overall we felt that the officers had not come adequately prepared for the very difficult and well researched questions they encountered from an audience which though small has a vital interest in the question of where the Fire Station should be and how many engines it can provide fully staffed.  Did the officers consider that a public meeting in an area of such high deprivation there may be residents attending who could actually read business plans, compose cogent and articulate questions and expect more than a muffled grunt of yes or no in response to an answer; we suspect not?  

Residents were also very worried about the fact that no new fire fighting personnel have been recruited since 2009 and that very soon we will be losing experienced staff and their skills to the detriment of the service and our community as whole.

The consultation ends on 8 December so there is still time to make your views known of this subject by going to

http://www.westyorksfire.gov.uk/news/Fire+Cover+Proposals

or

Full consultation is open until 9 December 2011, and formal representations must be made in writing/email to Stephen Hardy, Consultation Co-ordinator, West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority, Oakroyd Hall, Bradford Road, Birkenshaw, BD11 2DY or stephen.hardy@westyorksfire.gov.uk

A special Hotline has also been set up to guide people through the consultation process:
01274 655717

Cup cake book club presents: the new community bookcase!!

Since our local library was closed by the Council, the Cup Cake Book Club was formed.

We started meeting at our local pub, the Spring Close Tavern, where we received a warm welcome. So much so, that not only are we provided with coffee and tea, and special cup cake napkins, but the landlord has decided to build a bookcase to house our books.

People can now go to the pub and read a book ( there is a growing children's section as well), or take a book home and leave a small donation to charity.

The bookcase proved so successful, that the collection box made £35 within a few weeks,and last Tuesday, we had the grand opening.

Local councillors were present, as well as councillor Ogilvie, who is responsible for the libraries in the Leeds City Council, and staff from the mobile library service to speak about their job and listen to people's suggestions and feedback.

It was a great night:

Councillor Ogilvie cut the ribbon to the bookcase,







The cakes were especially made for the occasion, reflecting both Halloween night and the loss of our local library.











We all enjoyed the conversation,





and the warmth of the fireplace.




We enjoyed a drink and learned a lot about other book clubs in the city.









Many thanks to the landlord, Mike, for his warm hospitality!!





Mike with councillor Ogilvie.

The jewel at the heart of our local community

East End Park is an area almost totally lacking in basic infrastructure but there is a shining beacon of community spirit and engagement.  The Spring Close Tavern has been a pub since it was built in the 1840's and was once part of the famous East Street Run.  Over the last twenty years the pub, like the surrounding area, has been allowed to become run down but in 2009 when new manager Mike Andrew took it over the Spring Close started on its journey from local dump to neighbourhood treasure.

It has not been easy to turn around a pub with a previously bad reputation but with a great deal of hard work and persistence by both Mike and his partner Chris this has been achieved.

Mike and Chris have introduced a selection of hand-pulled high quality local beers and now have such a reputation for supplying these ales that they are to appear in the 2012 CAMRA Good pub guide for Leeds.  The next step along the way is to introduce simple top quality pub food.

 

The pub plays host to many local community groups who, without its generous support, would be without a venue for their members to socialise; amongst them is a fishing club and the East End Park Bowling Club who now proudly wear club shirts sponsored by the Spring Close.

Mike and Chris  really believe in putting something back into their community and when COVEN explained about the closure of our library in Richmond Hill and the lack of adequate provision for reading in the area they, without hesitation, offered to host the Cupcake Book Club on the first Tuesday of every month. At the book club meetings members bring along home baked cupcakes to share and also discuss books, life and the universe! Due to the club’s runaway success the pub has since put in a bookcase where people can leave donated books and others can either take books home to read or maybe enjoy a chapter or two whilst sitting by the roaring open fire. For those who wish to a small donation can be made to St Gemma's Hospice for the use of the books.  There is even a small children’s section and plans to add a toy library in the future as supervised children are welcome before 7pm in the evening. So far this project has offered a wide variety of books to people who may find it difficult to get to the new mobile libraries and customers have raised £35 for St Gemma’s from this scheme.

The pub provides tea and coffee as an alternative  for those who prefer a non alcoholic drink with their treats and the popularity of this  group has spawned a Genealogy group and a Craft group, both run by local people helping to provide much needed low cost entertainment and community support to friends and neighbours  and to pass on traditional skills which are now coming back into favour.

All in all this little pub has once again become a focal point for the community of East End Park and Richmond Hill and we must do our utmost to see that it does not go the way of other former treasures of the community and end up either bought by a property developer and left to go derelict until land prices rise again or turned into more unneeded and expensive flats which add nothing to the community infrastructure where they are based but take so much away.

AT LAST and only 1 week before the meeting the time, date and venue for the Richmond Hill Forum

The time and venue for the next Richmond Hill Forum have been confirmed only ONE WEEK from the date of the meeting.

Richmond Hill Forum Agenda Papers

This is an important meeting and despite the lack of notice we would urge as many as possible of you to get to this meeting if you possibly can.

Waste Management is supposedly coming to this meeting as as we are nearly at the deadline for announcing the lucky winner of the PFI Incinerator contract lottery.

We need to be there and show the strength of our feelings on this matter.  The time has come to stand up and be counted, not only for our area and our children's futures but for the future of the whole city.

Come along to the meeting, tell your friends and neighbours about it.  There are many important things to do with this area on the Agenda and this is the ONLY forum in the whole city were ordinary residents can come along and have their say.

The last band concert of the summer of 2011

The last band concert of 2011 was a complete success!  The weather was perfect, warm and pleasant with a gentle breeze.

Thanks to the generosity of a new local firm, Northern Hospitality Ltd we had tables to set up an eating area and as you can see picnicking is was the order of the day.

Refreshments and cup cakes were on offer donated by local residents and businesses as were the prizes in the Raffle held to raise funds for The Friends of East End Park.

While some of those who attended the concert took shelter from the sun under a convenient tree, those of our visitors who had fur coats that they could not remove soon settled down to snooze in the fresh air.

The COVEN Cup Cake Book Club, which meets at the Spring Close on the first Tuesday of every month, supplied free books for people to read, enjoy and pass on.  The Book Club is very keen to keep the people of Richmond Hill reading since we lost our library.  This month's book was Smut by the famous local author Alan Bennett who was kind enough to contact the members to wish us well with the our endeavours and to commend the book to us.

It is the aim of the Friends of East End Park to stage other entertainments in the park in the coming year with an even wider appeal to people, both locally and across the city so watch this space for further details on that.

A special thank you must go to the park staff especially Tracy and Mick who have worked tirelessly to help produce the concerts as well as working hard the whole year round to keep the park to a very high standard we could not have done it without you.