There will be a meeting of the community council at 7pm on Monday 2nd September in the Burgh Chambers of the Town Hall, Queen's Gardens. There will be a short break at about 8pm during which the 200 Club draw will be made.
(Read for accuracy in matters of substance - harangue the secretary for minor errors (spelling etc) outwith the meeting).
(For anyone wishing to address the meeting on a matter relevant to St Andrews. Please contact the Secretary or Chair before the meeting. Priority will be given to those who have been invited to speak or have given advance notice).
Presentation by Carly Gillett on a peer-led project giving young people in the town a means to express their opinions.
[June 7.10] Ken Crichton to report.
As this seems unlikely for a while... details of this year's criteria are at www.communityoftheyear.co.uk if anyone wants to take over looking at this.
[July 6.6] Further meeting on 22 Aug decided on St Andrews and Cupar locations, dates in November and subjects centred on CC Finance and Common Good Funds for these seminars. Details should be available by October's meeting [PL].
[August 7.3.] Agreed in principle to take part last month.
Who will represent us?
Appendix A: Correspondence
Appendix A.1: Letter to Jim Hooton, Community Services
Appendix A.2: Letter (originally published in The Courier) on the problems at the Botanic Gardens from Edith Cormack, Chairman of the Friends of St Andrews Botanic Garden
she adds:
"I would welcome an opportunity to show Community Councillors round the Botanic Garden to give some insight into its significance and attraction. I lead such a walk there on the first Sunday of each month (March-October inclusive) at 2pm for the general public. Councillors would be most welcome to join the walk on September 1st or October 6th. Alternatively, I should be very pleased to arrange a special visit for Community Councillors.”
She suggests Saturday, September 7th or Sunday September 8th at 2pm – to last about an hour (plus tea!).
Appendix A.3: Response from Jim Hooton, Community Services
[August 3.4.] Appendix B
[August 4.4.7.] Joe Lamb to report
No response from Iain Whitelaw as yet [PL]
Law & Admin write that May Day has been set to Monday 5th May.
[August 7.1.] In response to queries raised last month Jim Hooton notes:
A funball is where the kids pitch a ball into a raised bowl shaped structure the ball comes out of one of four tubes.It is designed to test speed of coordination.
The existing equipment does not meet new European standards and is being replaced as and when the resources become available.
The skateboarding at Pipelands Road will be dealt with under a separate heading. £500,000 has been identified for skateboarding across Fife.
Other play areas ok at the moment.
Ken fell seriously ill during August. Members were informed by e- and post mail. A 'Get Well' message has been sent on behalf of community council.
Joe Peterson has taken in hand the Garden Competition with the assistance of the Recreation Committee and Bill Sangster. We may also need someone to stand in for Ken on the:
Any offers?
Penny Uprichard proposes that:
7.2.1. Wheelie Bins Consideration should be given to locating the owners of the 10 or 11 wheely bins at the top of College Street, and seeing if better arrangements can be made to store them particularly in view of the number of tourists occupying tables and chairs nearby.
7.2.2. A Boards Consideration should be given to the banning of A-boards in the town centre of St. Andrews. There is currently no limit on the size or number of A-boards, which are a considerable inconvenience to pedestrians, and a hazard to visually handicapped people. There are at the moment at least two businesses, and probably more, which have 3 A-boards out on the streets.
Fife Care & Repair write that Fife Council have smoke, carbon monoxide and cold detectors available free to eligible homeowners or private tenant aged over 60 (or over 50 and disabled). Details available.
September 2002: Leader+ & Direct Grants Scheme (information day 5/9); Help for people with mental health difficulties; Camelot Foundation grants for charities supporting young people; Charities Aid Foundation streamlines its grants; Homestart needs volunteers; AGM to focus on Disclosure (body making police checks on behalf of voluntary organisation); Stars at VONEF 10th birthday.
AGM & Funding Seminar: Volunteer House Cupar 5/9/02 12 noon.
FoE Summer newsletter: The World Summit, time to tame the corporates; Campaigns news; Green Office Exhibition; Scottish Exec delivers traffic growth; (Super)Quarry quarrel; Taking on the Corporations at home; Europe hears beach concerns; Fish farm damage; How has Scotland Performed since Rio; Transport & environmental justice; Government solar plans ‘not so bright'; Organic farming needs help to grow.
8.3.1. Workload As no one else wants to do Secretary I suppose Event and Planning will have to go.
[Copy of Event enclosed with the paper agendas]
8.3.2. October Absence I shall prepare and circulate the agenda as normal.
Who will write up the October minutes? Provided they are typed / emailed I can distribute them for November.
8.3.3. Attendance sheet Someone wrote a good question on last month's sheet “What is the purpose of this”? Pure bureaucracy, in particular:
So do please remember to sign the sheet even if you come in late.
Written reports are required by terms of the Scheme for Community Councils.
For any verbal reports of meetings attended etc. Issues requiring a decision by community council should be raised under items 6 Matters Arising or 7 New Business, as appropriate.
Please notify Chair of items before the start of the meeting or at the break. Hint: Given that the end of the meeting is often taken in something of a rush, unless items are urgent it might be better to submit them for next meeting's New Business.
A.1 To Community Services
You will no doubt be aware that coming third in the Best Kept Town competition was a sad disappointment to St Andrews. However it was not entirely unexpected. Members of community council had expressed their concern about the state of parts of the town in Fife Council's care in the run-up to the judging. The judges' comments on St Andrews bore out some of our fears over late plantings, but the poor state of the Botanic Gardens came as an extremely unwelcome surprise. Fortunately the judge was guided away from the John Knox Road area where he would have seen, and doubtless remarked upon, the bare earth and scattering of weeds that remain of the rose beds there, some weeks after they were cleared.
As the work of Fife Council is a common factor to the towns and villages competing it is important that a 'level playing field' should apply. We do not believe this was achieved on this occasion. We would like to know if the money spent by Fife Council on the appearance of the various settlements was equal, in proportion to their sizes, this year in the period up to the judging.
However community council would also like to look forward to next year. For our part we intend to take a more active interest in the general preparations through the town. To help us in this we'd like to see the the judges' comments for the other towns in our area and category to put our result in context - perhaps this could be made standard practice to help all contestants raise standards Fife-wide?
A.2 From Edith Cormack, Chairman Friends of St Andrews Botanic Garden.
St Andrews Botanic Garden is magnificent, acclaimed by visitors, local, national and international. Fife Council, dependent on a small, dedicated, highly trained staff, just manages to maintain the present very high standard. It must have been most disheartening for the gardeners there to read the Courier report (8.8.02) carrying adverse criticism, especially when the named area has been undergoing renovation this summer.
Community Councillor Peterson's remarks are however pertinent. Work has fallen behind. The Garden is under-staffed. There is no way that the current five full-time gardeners can do all that is asked of them, even when supplemented by two summer casual workers. What they are able to achieve is miraculous.
Under staffing has been discussed with Fife Council officials for years. Staff once numbered twice what it does now. Lack of funding is the repeated and only excuse given.
The Botanic Garden is one of the renowned attractions of St Andrews, Fife and Scotland. Fife Council, as manager, carries the responsibility for keeping it so.
A.3 From Jim Hooton, Area Operational Team Leader, Community Services East.
I am in receipt of your e-mail dated 20th August 2002 the contents of which I have noted.
Like the Community Council I was disappointed that the judges had placed St. Andrews third. However, I firmly believe that the judges' views are final and regardless of any personal views or comments my Officers wish to make they are certainly not made in front of any judges. I have emphasised for years that judges must not be influenced in any way or form by Council Officials.
I note that the Community Council continually blame Fife Council for their failure to win this competition. I continually strive to inform the Community Council that it is not the local authority's contribution which is taken into account in this competition, but the contribution made by the community itself. Although there were one or two unsavoury and in my opinion, unjustified comments, regarding the Botanic Garden I am surprised that the judge allowed himself to be taken into the Botanic Garden as, in the main, areas such as parks, playgrounds etc only merit a small proportion of the judges' marks. The vast majority of the marks come from areas such as the overall cleanliness, the condition of properties both commercial and domestic and the contribution made by the community to the overall upkeep of the Town etc.
You mention in your communication about a level playing field applied, I can advise you that the allocation of money to St. Andrews is by far above any other town in East Fife. It is strange that all these clichés are now coming out of the woodwork when the allocation of money to St. Andrews since reorganisation has proportionately neither increased nor decreased in comparison to other towns and villages.
Where the town of Cupar scored marks over St. Andrews is quite simply the contribution made by the Community Council in seeking external funding to revamp the bandstand and flagpole in the Haugh Park. The Rotary also heavily contributed towards the construction of a raised flowerbed on the East Road. It is this type of community involvement that the judges mark highly.
I ask the question as to whether or not the person taking the judges around St. Andrews mentioned the contribution made to the Bow Butts Bandstand by the Community Council or the provision of hanging baskets at Petheram Bridge, these are the types of initiatives that the judges welcome.
Finally with the regard to the provision of bedding plants I accept that the Grounds Maintenance Section were a couple of weeks behind finishing off their planting. However this would have no overall bearing on the marking. The statement that appeared in the press claiming that the reason the bedding was delayed by Fife Council was to ensure that it was in flower during the Dunhill Cup is a load of rubbish since the bedding itself will be replaced by spring bedding in September. In Fife Council we try very hard to maintain standards within St Andrews and regardless of adverse comments appearing in the press we will continue to do so in future.
As the official responsible for the maintenance of parks within East Fife I would be only too happy to attend the next meeting of the Community Council along with my colleague Alistair Barnard who organises the competition to answer any queries you may wish to put forward.
Finally your elected members have copies of all the judges' remarks.
To Scottish Water
A Mrs Weir spoke to Monday's community council meeting to raise a problem with sewerage backing up and flooding into her and her neighbour's gardens and houses at Kinnessburn Road during the heavy rain last week (30/7). She said ESW had said this would not happen again with the upgraded system. Some else noticed water forcing its way up through the road surface, breaking up old patches, on Largo Road in the same storm.
We'd appreciate Scottish Water's comments on these incidents and the ability of the drainage system to cope with such storms since its upgrade over the last few years – was it designed to meet the load that night?
Response from Jim Falconer, Scottish Water
There were problems in many areas due to the exceptional rainfall that evening. However I have referred the matter to our Capital Investment team to ask them to have the St Andrews catchment solutions re-evaluated to make sure there is not a design problem. I am also currently looking at operational issues to ensure there were no problems from that end which would have caused failure of the system. If all the measures around Kinnessburn Road catchment had operated as expected I am confident there should not have been flooding in that area. I will be in touch with the Weirs in the near future to discuss the events to help with the investigations.
| Date | From | Subject | to |
| 12/8/02 | Community Services | Jubilee Commemorative Book | |
| 15/8/02 | Fife Care & Repair | free Smoke etc Detectors | |
| 15/8/02 | Fife Supplies | 2003 Calendars & Diaries | |
| 16/8/02 | VONEF | September newsletter | |
| 17/8/02 | East Area Services Committee | agenda 21/08/02 | |
| 17/8/02 | Calor Gas Scotland | Community of the Year extension | |
| 17/8/02 | Planning Service | open doors day 8/9/02 | |
| 19/8/02 | Scottish Civic Forum | Forum on Discrimination newsletter | |
| 19/8/02 | Vivienne Knaggs | 200 Club | |
| 20/8/02 | E Fife Community Safety WG | Agenda 22/8/02 | JP |
| 21/8/02 | Environmental Services | Environmental Consultants | |
| 23/8/02 | Law & Admin | Common Good Fund application | AS |
| 23/8/02 | Orange | Upgrade New Picture House basestation | Pln |
| 23/8/02 | FoE | Newsletter summer 2002 | |
| 23/8/02 | Glasdon ltd | Bins newssheet | |
| 28/8/02 | Law & Admin | Local Holidays 2003 | |
| 28/8/02 | Husson International | Play Equipment |