Join Belmont Library for coffee, cake and books on 7 December

 

 

There will be a special celebration at Belmont Library this Thursday (7 December 2017) as the library celebrates being open for 25 years.

 

Located in the vibrant Belmont Community Centre, Eastholme Road. Belmont Library continues to provide a valued service to the local community, welcoming 22,500 visitors a year. The library is a gateway to over 200,000 books, DVDs and audio books held in Herefordshires public libraries. Customers can take out up to 12 books at a time. Reservations are free, computer and Wi-Fi access is free and there are no overdue charges for children or teenagers.

 

Jan Nesaratnam, Senior Librarian for Herefordshire Councils library service, said:

 

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Belmont Library continues to inspire a love of books in both children and adults and we know how much it is valued by the local community. We hope lots of people will come along to celebrate the librarys 25th birthday with us.

 

Drop in to Belmont Library on Thursday 7 December (10am-12pm). Everyone is welcome for coffee and cake and there will be book giveaways for young children.

 

Herefordshire Council has announced changes to the Cabinet Member portfolios.

 

Leader of Herefordshire Council, Councillor Tony Johnson, has streamlined Councillor David Harlow’s member responsibility so he will become Cabinet Member for Economy and Communications. This enables Councillor Harlow to focus on economic development, regeneration and the Hereford Enterprise Zone in line with Herefordshire Council’s priority to support the growth of the local economy. Councillor Harlow will also have responsibility for broadband and communications strategy.

 

Councillor Nigel Shaw will add corporate services to his portfolio to become Cabinet Member for Finance, Housing and Corporate Services. As part of his corporate services remit, Councillor Shaw will take on additional responsibility for areas such as emergency planning and business continuity, legal and democratic services, registration and coroner services, human resources and health and safety.

 

Councillor Barry Durkin will become Cabinet Member for Transport and Regulatory Services as he broadens his portfolio with responsibility for environmental health, trading standards, licensing, bereavement services and markets and fairs.

 

Councillor Bramer, Cabinet Member for Contracts and Assets, will take responsibility for shared services and contract management policy.

 

Councillor Paul Rone, as Cabinet Member for Health and Wellbeing, will incorporate community engagement and development into his portfolio.

 

Councillor Tony Johnson, Leader of Herefordshire Council, said:

 

“The Cabinet Member portfolio changes are designed to support our commitment to economic growth, building houses and creating jobs across the county.”

 

 

The full list of Cabinet Members as of 1 December 2017:

 

Councillor Tony Johnson

Leader of the council / Corporate strategy and budget

 

 

Councillor Jonathan Lester

Deputy leader of the council / Young people and children’s wellbeing

 

 

Councillor Harry Bramer

Contracts and assets

 

 

Councillor David Harlow

Economy and communications

 

 

Councillor Nigel Shaw

Finance, housing and corporate services

 

 

Councillor Paul Rone

Health and wellbeing

 

 

Councillor Philip Price

Infrastructure

 

 

Councillor Barry Durkin

Transport and regulatory services

Things are steadily getting worse on Hereford's estates with not much activity on the ground.

 

 

Here on Newton Farm not only are Herefordshire Housing cutting the bulk of the grass, but also the Council's agents (used to be Amey and now Balfour Beatty), and in the case of our street, we pay a service charge for Muir Group Housing to cut the grass and keep the area tidy. 

 

There is no co-ordination between these bodies, so some grass gets cut and other areas are left to be cut at a later date. This results in an unkempt appearance and local residents not knowing who is responsible for which piece of land. There are pieces of land which have never been cut this year. The problems around the electricity sub-station in Sherborne Close still continue, with fly tipping amd split rubbish bags spewing their contents over the pavements every weekend. Not much hope of anything been done as this has been occuring and visible to anyone passing through this area since the first post here in June 2010.

 

This lack of co-ordination and co-operation to maintain our estates goes back to 2002 when the council handed over most of our green, open spaces to Herefordshire Housing and other Registered Social Landlords, when they got rid of their housing stock. Since then and several recessions later we were told these alterations and efficiency savings would benefit us the council tax payers and be easier to manage in the future. As we can now see this way of working has failed. There should be one contractor to cover the whole area by adopting all the open space. Balfour Beatty having got their £200 million contract with the council, and possibly a phone line connected in the near future, things could be different, but I doubt it.

 

 

 

The Visionscape Group brought the company in September and have now reinstated 50 jobs, with a further 20 positions planned by mid-2018.

 

The company now named Vision Gelpack Ltd is under the leadership of managing director Geoff Davis.

He said: “I am especially delighted that we have been able to restore production and employment at our Grandstand Road plant so quickly.

 

“I am also excited by the many new opportunities that the Visionscape Group represents, with its global closed loop philosophy, which ensures that the recovery opportunities for each product are fully maximized.”

 

Vision Gelpack manufactures polyethylene films, liners and sacks for the local authority, waste management, janitorial, clinical and medical and other industrial sectors.

 

“We are excited to welcome Vision Gelpack to the Visionscape Group," said Harry Ackerman, executive director at Visionscape. “With over four decades in profitable business, Vision Gelpack was a great strategic fit for us and value-added on all sides. We have made an excellent investment and Vision Gelpack’s established reputation will enable Visionscape to provide a more comprehensive range of services and solutions to the millions in the markets we operate.”

 

Visionscape is a global environmental utility group providing turnkey solutions in areas of sanitation, energy and waste water treatment. The company aims to reinvent waste management processes, specific to emerging markets, utilising cutting-edge technology and tools to address the waste management needs of megacities. Visionscape also offers services for commercial, residential, industrial, and healthcare clients.

Herefordshire Council News 13 October 2014 

Rotherwas Rail Proposal

 

Herefordshire Council hosted the first meeting with rail industry stakeholders to discuss rail proposals for Rotherwas on 7 October.

 

The meeting which included representatives from Network Rail and London Midland train operating company brought together a cross party discussion around how emerging proposals to re-introduce rail facilities into Rotherwas might be progressed.

 

Councillor Bob Matthews, leader of the Independent Group, set out the proposals which would include passenger services and potential for rail freight for the discussion, said ‘We have had a very productive and constructive meeting with key stakeholders and the next steps will be to get more detailed feedback on how the proposals should be developed. The Independent Group is committed to seeing this scheme delivered but appreciate that it will need a sound business case before funding can be secured.’

 

Cllr Johnson, Leader of the Council, chaired the meeting and commented, ‘The meeting was very productive and we have secured the support of Network Rail and London Midland (train operating company) to assist us with reviewing these proposals. Based on the advice and feedback from the rail industry experts, the production of a business case and the identification of funding sources, we intend to develop a plan for how the proposal might move forward.’

There is a misconception that all housebuilders are solely focused on churning out homes without thought for the communities they are establishing. If there are housebuilders out there with this singular, limited ambition then Redrow is certainly not one of them.

Sustainability and creating places where people want to live are not optional extras for Redrow, it’s firmly entrenched in our DNA. For us sustainability is not just about building with sustainable materials and protecting local wildlife. It means creating thriving communities that are fit for the future.

The starting point for each of our developments is our placemaking principles which are embedded in the design and layout of our sites. These include ensuring that schemes fit sensitively with the local area, that they feature large open spaces and plenty of nature habitats, that residents can easily make their way around the area and are well connected to public transport.

For example, 95% of our homes are within 500 metres of a public transport link. All this ensures a place that fosters a sense of wellbeing among the people living there – and the broader community too. As a housebuilder we invested £163m in facilities and infrastructure across the year ending 30 June 2017, to bring people together and foster a real sense of pride in place.

We are increasingly delivering large communities around the country. Often these developments are on former industrial brownfield land, from Colindale Gardens in north west London, to Ebbsfleet Green at Ebbsfleet Garden City in Kent and Woodford Garden Village in Cheshire.

These developments enable us to embed our placemaking principles at scale. These new communities offer residents swathes of green space, orchards, allotments, running trails, cycling infrastructure and the homes are constructed to the highest quality standards we can deliver.

Smaller sites, by their very nature, have less space in which to create these amenities and facilities. However, we work hard to ensure all our residents can benefit from clean, green lifestyles. All Redrow developments have a green travel plan, for example, and on some smaller sites we have instigated projects to create bee-friendly planting and have installed hedgehog highways to boost native animal and insect species.

Boosting biodiversity Harold the hedgehog at Redrow’s hedgehog highway at Glenwood Park, Barnstaple. The scheme was a winner at this year’s Big Biodiversity Challenge Awards.
Credit: Andrea Ormesby

We also pay particular attention to the impact our developments will have on the local area and the wider environment during construction. We have achieved certification to the international environmental management standard ISO 14001. Some 99.98% of the wood we use to build our homes is from sustainable sources. Our extensive use of sustainably sourced timber won us a coveted Three Trees Award, for the second time, from WWF.

We have set ourselves an ambitious goal to work towards achieving biodiversity net gain on our developments. Biodiversity net gain is a development that leaves biodiversity in a better state than before. We’ve already started work on achieving this goal by commissioning a project to evaluate our biodiversity position on three key sites.

The study revealed that, once completed, two of the three sites will achieve biodiversity net gain positions, with work being done on the third site to advance towards this net aim. The results of this study are helping to inform the development of a strategic biodiversity action plan in Redrow, encompassing net gain principles and partnership working.

The aim of achieving a net gain position also incorporates economic and social responsibility. We commission an annual socio-economic footprint report to obtain a robust, reliable and transparent assessment of the total impact of our activities. The report, for our most recently completed financial year, showed that we have contributed £1.14bn of gross value added (GVA) to UK economic output.

In respect to social net gain the footprint reported 13,200 direct, indirect and induced employment through Redrow, its sub-contractors and suppliers, equating to three jobs per every home built. Staying on the theme of social net gain we are also developing a social value calculator (SVC). This tool will help us to evaluate the social value, in monetary terms, of all our developments. The SVC, once completed, will also be used as a forecasting tool to help inform our decision making on the configuration of our developments to achieve maximum social value.

To challenge the negativity that envelops volume housebuilding, the industry must work towards developing strategies that deliver positive sustainability outcomes for society.

A key consideration in the development of these strategies is determining how to become smarter at measuring the social, environmental and economic impact of developments. We must then use this data and information to make informed judgements that support the delivery of net positive solutions.

Herefordshire Council will no longer permit the use of sky lanterns and helium balloons on council owned or leased land and at council run events. Their use will also be discouraged at licensed events across the county.

The use of sky lanterns (also known as Chinese lanterns) and helium balloons have become a popular way to mark a special event, yet their use poses a serious threat to wildlife and the environment as it is impossible to control where the released lanterns and balloons land.

Sky lanterns and balloons pose a serious threat to livestock – animals eat lantern debris which can be poisonous or puncture internal organs, and smaller birds can become trapped and killed. There are also environmental dangers with littering, the risk of fire to crops and trees and a significant danger to aircraft and helicopters.

Councillor David Harlow, Cabinet Member for Economy and Corporate Services, said:

“The use of sky lanterns and helium balloons pose a serious threat to the county’s environment and wildlife, so I am pleased Herefordshire Council has joined over 60 other councils across the UK in banning their use.

“The use of sky lanterns and helium balloons will no longer be allowed at licensed events, or at events run on council owned or leased land. We would encourage those celebrating special occasions or fundraising to consider more environmentally-friendly options, such as planting a tree, or using lighting, bunting and flags.”

 

 

 

We notified Balfour Beatty about our second action day weeks in advance, yet a week after all of our hard work I find myself picking up some of our own litter from the bags we left last weekend. 

 

Yes it is all still there! Nothing has been collected! 

 

All these volunteers have given up their day and time to commit to this fantastic project and it feels like we are unappreciated with this lack of response, not impressed at all.

 

I am also waiting for promised emails and the results from the tree survey which took place weeks ago, I am starting to realise why things take so long in this city, well I am not going away, on the contrary, I will just increase the volume!