Minutes of Steering Group Meeting,
Kidmore End Parish NDP Steering Group
4th May 2020 at 7.30pm
Zoom video call
- Apologies
2. Declaration of interest
No change from the last meeting.
3. Minutes of last meeting and matters arising
The final version of the minutes of the last meeting was approved.
Due to Covid-19, the date of this meeting has been pushed back from 15th April to 4th May 2020.
4. Feedback on drafts:
a) Policies
At the last meeting the Steering Group had talked through the draft policy wording with SODC and were awaiting more detailed feedback.
Since then, member of SODC NDP planning team has provided 50 comments / observations on the draft policy wording and members of the Steering Group have reviewed and submitted comments on observations back to SODC.
A summary of the key points was provided to the Steering Group in advance of this meeting.
In general, the comments received from SODC are favourable and supportive of the overall approach, including the AONB and Buffer policies. They suggested some good alternative wording in places which the Steering Group have reviewed and will adopt where appropriate.
One of the remaining areas of complexity / confusion relates to the alignment of the NDP to either SODC’s adopted Core Strategy 2012 or the emerging Local Plan 2034. SODC NDP planning team has responded to a request from the Steering Group to provide some clarity on this and has confirmed that her comments take into account the content of both of these documents, with the caveat that the emerging Local Plan could significantly change before adoption. SODC recognise that the Neighbourhood Plan will not be assessed until after the Emerging Local Plan is adopted (planned for December 2020). This means that although we need to align the Kidmore End Parish NDP to the Core Strategy in the immediate term we need to keep up to date with SODC’s Emerging Local Plan as our policies will need to fully align with the adopted Local Plan by the time we go to Referendum.
Following the comments and clarifications received from SODC, some revised drafting is required. A group member continues to take the lead on this and is continuing to refer to other adopted NDPs in South Oxfordshire for appropriate wording, for example on infill land. Going forward, SODC seem likely to base infill on character rather than density which is complex for us with our 5 villages and differing characters and densities in each.
Since the last meeting we have been approached by Aecom to ask for feedback on their package. We have replied with mixed feedback, pointing out the benefits of their engagement and some of the areas for improvement.
b) Green spaces
A group member has distributed the Green Spaces draft document before the meeting and has asked the Steering Group to review the draft and provide comments. This document is planned to be used as an Appendix to the NDP.
There are some maps to add in which the Steering Group are trying to source.
c) Draft Consultation Statement
A group member gave an overview of the draft consultation statement. This was distributed to the Steering Group in advance of the meeting. There are a number of different templates that have been used by different communities for their Neighbourhood plan. We need to decide how much information we should put into the Statement as opposed to the main neighbourhood plan. The Steering Group agreed that the current draft is a great start and to add more detail in order to keep all related points and facts in one place.
Actions:
Group member to continue with the drafting of policies.
Steering Group to provide feedback to group member on the content of the draft Green Spaces document.
To contact mapping contact at SODC, to establish what we are permitted to print with regard to maps with the PSGA (public sector geospatial agreement) the council has with SODC.
Group member to add a table into the consultation document to show the engagements that have taken place, including sub-groups and steering group meetings.
5. Writing the plan
The Steering Group agreed that we need to have a completed draft of the policies before we start to draft the neighbourhood plan.
The Steering Group agreed that although we already have a lot of content and need to put this all together it would be useful to use a professional to ensure continuity of style.
We have investigated the copywriters used by other neighbourhood planning groups and hasn’t found anyone who has outsourced it yet.
Actions:
Group member to approach Community First Oxfordshire and SODC and possibly Aecom to ask if they have a copywriter/editor
Group member to contact a local copywriter she knows.
6 and 7. Finance and grant application
The outstanding grant funds of £797.12 were sent back as we hadn’t used them and didn’t have a short term plan to use them.
The Steering Group agreed that we will decide as the NDP progresses what funds we need.
The Steering Group discussed how to continue to involve the community during Covid-19 restrictions, particularly with reference to the most immediate need to provide information on the updated policies. The group agreed we needed to continue to move forward and suggested running a virtual consultation on the website with a PowerPoint with voice over. We could provide links to the relevant documents and invite residents to ask questions either before or after the virtual event or both. To be decided.
Actions:
To contact webmaster for parish council website, to discuss what is technically possible.
8. SODC Emerging Local Plan
In advance of the meeting, Links relating to comments from the inspector on SODC’s emerging local plan and the responses from SODC.have been distributed to group via email
Information relevant for the Kidmore End Parish NDP includes SODC highlighting in their feedback that they did not plan to build on land bordering Reading and also highlighting that there is no agreement with Reading to take any of Reading’s housing needs.
Actions:
To re-send the links
9. Reading Golf Course:
Developers for Reading Golf course have put in a scoping document for 275 houses on the Reading side of the golf course. The initial public consultation was for 245 houses.
10. RBC transport strategy consultation 2036
Everyone to read Reading’s transport strategy consultation as this has implications for South Oxfordshire.
Actions:
Feedback what action the parish council are taking to respond to the consultation document.
11. Correspondence
The Steering Group has been made aware that since the last meeting the Chairman of the Parish Council received one letter relating to the NDP from a small group of residents.
The group discussed the option of putting an update on the website regarding the NDP and our intention to continue with policies to progress with the plan
Actions:
Write an update for the parish website to inform the community that we are continuing to progress with the NDP
12. AOB
Reminder the group of information she had sent out previously that the government has given a directive that there can’t be any NDP referendums until May 2021.
13. Date of next meeting
The date of the next meeting to be confirmed when we get the next feedback from SODC regarding the policy document.