Agenda and draft minutes

Only members of the core membership are eligible to be nominated as the Chair. Either the Chair or Vice-Chair of the Local Community Network shall be a Somerset Council Councillor.

Only voting members can make nominations. The nomination must be seconded to be valid.

To participate in the election of the Chair and Vice-Chair, as a core member of the LCN, you will need to be physically present at the meeting. (For more information please see Terms of Reference).

Nominations–Councillor Phillip Ham was nominated by Edric Hobbs and seconded by Martin Lovell. 

Unanimous election and Councillor Phillip Ham was voted in.  

Philip Ham thanked everyoneinvolved and made a promise to get to every LCN meeting around the area.  

Only members of the core membership are eligible to be nominated as the Vice-Chair. Either the Chair or Vice-Chair of the Local Community Network shall be a Somerset Council Councillor.

Only voting members can make nominations. The nomination must be seconded to be valid.

To participate in the election of the Chair and Vice-Chair, as a core member of the LCN, you will need to be physically present at the meeting. (For more information please see Terms of Reference).

Nominations received for:

ClaireSully (nominated by Martin Lovell)

Tony Robbins (nominated by Rob Reed, seconded by Martin Lovell.). 

As Claire was not present to confirm if she would liketo take the role, the nomination was withdrawn.  

Councillor Tony Robbinswas elected asVice Chair. 

All agreed the yearly report highlighted the greatprogressthat had been made.More information can be found in the slides here. 

Action 1: 

Circulate the report to local groups and stakeholders.  

Flooding is still a big issue, affecting;Nunney, Dean and Cranmore.  This remains anarea of focus for the LCN, and in particular the Flooding and Resilience working group.It was agreed to proceed with the delivery of an Emergency Planning workshop. 

Action 2:

Confirm the dateand circulate details to all parishes to attend the workshops involving the civil contingencies and Somerset Rivers Authority - Emergency Planning workshop. There are £5000 Grants available.  

The report has beensent to all Parish clerks, and Parish Councillors. The report is going to be added to parish websitesand social media.  

Action 3:

Kate to arrange a meeting with Highways Service and parish representatives. Please make sure all the questions for highways officers are submitted in advance so that the Highways team can come to the working group prepared.

LCN link workers are being interviewed and someone will be in place to help as soon as possible. 

Do we need to include Quarries operations? – This question has been answered before. The Quarries are highly regulated.  All the water testing is completed regularly.Therefore, no, they do not need to be involved.  

The LCN Link officers present provided an overview of the work of the LCNS across Somerset. More information is available in the slide pack which can be viewed?here. 

Cllr Edric Hobbs provided an overview of a recent meeting with the police pertaining to another LCN area.    

Action 4- The LCN team to liaise with the police regarding attendance at the Shepton LCN twice per year.Invite the police and crime commissioner and a senior police officer to attend the LCN meeting on 30th September and provide data and information on antisocial behaviour and low-level crime. 

At this point the room divided into a breakout session including those participants online. 

A)        What are we missing from the local LCN?   

·         More information on planning – update on Local Plan, training and briefing sessions on the role of PC and enforcement. 

·         Quarry working group = different ways of working and attitudes. 

·         Parish Council cannot share problems in isolation, their issues are shared – particularly flooding. 

·         Local action plans. Born from community plans. 

·         Share Local Community plans with LCN. 

·         Support for fewer main meetings – 3 a year was mentioned. 

·         Priority for anti-social behaviour /low level crime for the forthcoming year. Information and data required on stats, what to look for etc. 

·         More sharing of good practise – e.g. how has Taunton or Exmoor achieved what they have?  Chairs and Vice-Chairs of working groups of other LCNs invited to future meetings to present how they have done it and answer questions. 

B)        What matters to residents in our communities? 

·         Get rid of the red tape.  

·         Planning enforcement – Better understanding to reduce parishioner frustration. 

·         Health and Support – Signposting – Mental Health, GP  

·         Holding Social housing providers to account – Problems for some but not all.  

·         Education – State of the Schools – Kids struggling post COVID 11–14-year olds. 

·         Buses – not constantly reliable for an ordinary life. Evercreech has a bus partnership member = Pro-active involvement.  How to get timetable coordination. 

·         MUPs – Evercreech? 

·         Cost of Living  

·         More People at parish Council meetings, how to encourage more?They are concerned but do not come forward. 

·         A lot on socialmedia - Planning – Housing – But do not come to the parish council meetings!!! 

Discussion from the group work: 

·         Fewer LCN main meetingswould be better, reducing to four times a year. Theworking groups are to feed in information to the main LCN meetings. 

·         Feedback from other LCN areas workgroups, should be available to be shared in the meeting.  Removing the red tape involved tohelp resolve local issues faster.   

·         Housing – Social housing and private housing, the impact on health- Is the housing stock up to standard?  Homes in rural areas that are not on a bus routes.  

·         Schools - some of the children are not in school full time, being on a part-time timetable. 

·         Mental health involved in school children. This is due to them not being in school full time. After effects of Covid.   

·         There is a big drug issue in Shepton;mostly cocaine.Why is the social hub in Hillmead not open? This can be used for SDAS (Somerset drug and alcohol service)drop-in sessions.Could this beat weekends too?This problem is the same across all the areas of somerset. 

·         Therewas  ...  view the full minutes text for item 48.

To agree the schedule of meetings for the next 12 months.

All Members are happy with the meeting dates below:  

·         30th September 2024 

·         27th January 2025 

·         28th April 2025 

·         7th July 2025 – AGM 

Venues to be confirmed.