Welcome to Edinburgh's
Southside Community Council






Minutes of 95th meeting, held on Wednesday 10 March 2010

Meetings are held from 7pm until 9pm on the second Wednesday of the month, from September until June, in the Nelson Hall, 5 Spittalfield Crescent, Edinburgh, EH8 9QZ
Telephone: 0131-667 8838
www.edinscc.org
*Further information on any of the items below is available from the Secretary, by using the above postal address or web site.

Abbreviations used as required:
ASCC = Association of Scottish Community Councils; CEC = The City of Edinburgh Council; CYP = Canongate Youth Project; DEG = Dumbiedykes Environmental Group; EACC = Edinburgh Association of Community Councils; EUSA = Edinburgh University Students’ Association; HMO = House(s) in Multiple Occupancy; LA = Licence Application; L&BP = Lothian & Borders Police; LHC = Late Hours Catering; NP = Neighbourhood Partnership; PA = Planning Application; SCC = Southside Community Council; SCNP = South Central Neighbourhood Partnership; SG = Scottish Government; SP = Scottish Parliament; TRO = Traffic Regulation Order; UoE = University of Edinburgh; and other initials = members of the SCC.

PRESENT:
Chairperson: Hilary McDowell (HM);
Elected and Nominated Members: John Largue (Treasurer) (JL), Susan Brown (SB), Caroline Barr (CB), Amy Williamson (AW), Liz Mulligan (LM), May Linton (ML), Sandra McCormack (SM), Michael Strain (MS), Bob Hodgart (RH).
City of Edinburgh Council: Councillor Steve Burgess
Deborah Charlesworth (acting Secretary, DC)
Members of the Public: Three.
1. Welcome and apologies for absence.
HM welcomed those present to the meeting. Apologies for absence were received from Colin Symes, Keith Smith and Nikki Thomson.

2. No Police Report due to Ben’s absence.

3. Policing

Inspector Ian Moffat and Constable Jeanette McCulloch outlined the changes proposed for policing. The aims are not changed from previous arrangements, but new police numbers should allow improvements. South and East Edinburgh will have 5 teams, ie 1 per Ward. Currently South Central Ward has 4 Community Beat Officers and the Council funded Neighbourhood Action Unit to call upon for matters relating to anti social Behaviour, who work together with Council Community Safety staff. From the 1st March there are 9 Safer Neighbourhood Team officers for the ward, rising to 10 on the 1st April. These officers are primarily focussed on community engagement and tackling local problems across the ward to meet the Force Prevention Strategy and the Scottish Governments principles on engagement. The additional officers for the ward are as a result of the Scottish Governments 1000 extra officers for Scotland.

Many questions were asked. Ian Moffat explained that new and untrained officers will not be used in these teams, but will take other roles, freeing more experienced people for neighbourhood policing. Beats will have teams of 3 officers (in busy areas), or 2. Currently, we have contact with a single individual, but it was hoped that the plans for maintaining contact that have been developed will work well. Ben, Jeanette and another officer yet to be identified will cover our Community Council area for local matters.

There will be a single email and phone number to contact the team, but having a team with multiple members should ensure coverage 7 days of the week by the entire Safer Neighbourhood Team, and in the majority of cases, the 3 local lead officers will be on duty at some point over the course of the day. The team members will either answer phone calls themselves, or (if not available when one phones) will get the necessary information passed on by means of e-voicemail. Currently, coverage can be absent when the present officer (Ben) is absent. The arrangement should be in place on a long-term basis. Local knowledge will be gained, and shared among the team members. Ian Moffat said that he wants to give increased visibility of police.

A major discussion point concerned the proposal for Environmental Forums to have a role in policing, unlike the current situation, where they deal with Environmental issues. The Community Council (CC) feel that this change is inappropriate, and is motivated by a wish to document public involvement, but that this involvement exists already, in a better form. Councillor Steve Burgess emphasised that it has been decided that organisation of policing will be on a ward basis, but the CC still saw no need, and many disadvantages, to the Environmental Forums being involved, because their meetings are too infrequent, and they cover a separate area (see above), and cannot deal with issues at the necessary spatial scale of neighbourhoods. It was emphasised that the current police officer regularly attends CC meetings, is trusted locally, and greatly valued. Insp. Moffat assured the CC that this officer will continue to work in our area, and that 1 of the 3 lead local officers will attend CC meetings often. Insp. Moffat will attend once a year, and another senior officer will also attend once per year, giving visits by senior staff on a 6 monthly basis.

Insp. Moffat was thanked for his helpful discussion.

4. Minutes of the Community Council meeting held on 13th January 2010
The minutes of the meeting on 10th February 2010 were approved.

5. Matters Arising
A letter from Fraser Goodall was discussed. It concerns a request that the Southside Community Centre should be open before the time when councillors’ surgeries begin, so that people arriving early do not have to wait outside. Mr. Goodall can see no way for the building to open before 6pm, so it was discussed whether the councillors’ surgeries might begin at 6.15 instead of 6. Steve Burgess agreed to ask other councillors whether this would be acceptable.

6. Co-option of secretary
Deborah Charlesworth of 17 West Preston St was co-opted as secretary.

7 & 9. Secretary’s Report and Correspondence (NOTE that item 8 is below)
The report was given by HM, because the acting secretary has just started and was not involved in these matters during the past month.
• HM provided a list of a large number of emails and paper correspondence (see list below). AW sent three letters / emails, the actions from the February meeting. It is unfortunate that the council often send announcements of events and consultation meetings with too little time allowed for local consultation. Given that Community Council meetings are monthly, at least 2 months’ notice is needed of any such event, for proper feedback to be prepared.
ACTION: Letters will be sent responding to these items, explaining the need for better notice, and regretting that the Community Council will be unable to attend several of these events, due to this inability to participate properly.
• Pedestrian crossing at Bernard Terrace. Emails suggest that some action will be taken to make this less dangerous. HM showed a new proposal for a solution to the difficulties, preferable to the proposed ‘pavement bulge’. This new idea involves a central traffic island, and slight loss of pavement on the side outside the Nelson Hall, to maintain the same road width. An island would allow pedestrians to assess traffic in the part of the road they need to cross, whereas at present it is necessary to see several directions at once.

PAPER CORRESPONDENCE
• Planning Aid: JL will attend this.
• Training for new Community Council members: DC and MS will attend this.
• Local Landscape Design: JL will attend to this.
• Papers to nominate a representative to EACC: RH was nominated.
• A ballot paper for a representative to ASCC was completed (Norman Tinlin).
• Edinburgh Community Representative Network: BC to attend


EMAILS
• Social Inclusion Newsletter will be forwarded to CB, AW and SB
• Community Councils Newsletter will be forwarded to CB and SB
• Civic Forum will be held on March 16th: JL and RH will attend.
• Earth Hour announcement: lights off for one hour from 8.30 pm on March 23 2010.
• VOICE (Training on Community empowerment) forwarded to CB
• Edinburgh Equalities Network forwarded to CB

8. Treasurer’s Report
• Balance £1228.94p.
• Expenditure £33 (photocopying and web site).

• A request was discussed from Canongate Youth Project who, although based in Infirmary St (outside our area) work in Dumbiedykes and other parts of the Community Council’s area. They ask for money for an Easter outing. It was agreed to suggest that they should apply to more appropriate funding sources, such as the Neighbourhood Partnership.

10. Planning and Licensing Committee Report (JL)
• The mosque was given permission for a small morgue and male toilets
• The availability of plans for the Festival Theatre building on March 17 (5-9pm) was announced. Members were reminded and encouraged to attend and invite anybody else who might be interested.
• JL will look at the planning application to drop the restriction of trading to between 1000 and 2300 hours at 54A S Clerk St. After the meeting JL discovered that the applicant wishes to be open until 2 am Mon to Thur, and 3 am at the weekends. An objection has been lodged on behalf of the CC.

11. Environmental Report
1. Lighting: A request has been placed to have numbers attached to all the lights in Dumbiedykes. A new scheme for numbering had been proposed but is taking so long to implement that the Lighting Dept has promised not to wait any longer, but just do something very soon. Other dark lamps have been reported and requests for the lighting on pedestrian refuges at the Informatics Building and Homebase to be fixed, Both longstanding problems.
2. Fly Posting: A joiner has been flyposting asking for work. The Environmental Wardens were instructed to phone the number.
3. Burst water main: During resurfacing of the bus stop area at 21 Newington Road a water main was burst on 21st Feb. It took a week to get the burst fixed because of difficulties raised by several businesses who were unwilling to allow the water main to be turned off. The water ran down as far as the Queens Hall because all three gullies on South Clerk St were blocked, a fact known since March 09. The flowing water was freezing and causing danger. Sandbags were placed to divert the water late Sunday night, but the following weekend the water was once again flowing to the Queens Hall. Urgent requests to have the gullies properly dealt with were copied to all the Councillors and appropriate Council staff, along with a threat to go to the press if adequate work wasn’t done within a week. The burst is now dealt with but all the asphalt laid at the bus stop has had to be excavated as it was so wet, and work has yet to be completed. There have been other problems with leaking water and the junction at West Preston St / Causewayside will have to be dug.
4. Crossing of Bernard Terrace at Nelson Hall: A roads engineer is now saying that a pavement blister is to be put in place instead of a pedestrian refuge. I am strongly resisting this. Contact has been made with Preston St School council, the SSA, Scoosh, Safe Routes to School, Nelson Hall Committee, the Cycling officer, etc and much pressure is being brought. Cllr Steve Burgess has found the junction is now 9th on the list of projects to aid pedestrian safety. Last year it was 87th. £6000 is set aside to progress this from the Roads Capital fund. Studying Government Roads Guidance shows that if a junction like this has vehicular traffic in excess of 300 vehicles per day, at least a pedestrian refuge should be installed. We had nearly that an hour in Jan 07, and I guess more now. One solution might be to widen the carriageway to the north to create space for a pedestrian refuge so that at least you can cross one direction of traffic at a time. A sketch of this proposal is being circulated at present. The Roads engineers hate the idea of trying to remove any parking provision. Our four councillors have all seen our proposal. This afternoon, 10/3/10, I received an email to say that the Roads Safety Team have now agreed to promote this location into their 10/11 programme of improvement works. They will prepare options. Cllr Mackenzie is setting up a meeting with roads engineers. HM has asked to be present.
5. The Meadows: It is a muddy mess. The Head of Parks, and Susan Bruce were in attendance at a meeting of Friends of the Meadows and Bruntsfield Links and challenged about this and other matters. There is an application for a licence for a second event associated with the Ladyboys of Bangkok. We suspect it’s the Chinese State Circus. Objections need to be in by 19th March. The CC was not notified.

14. Reports from Meetings attended.
• Scottish Health Council: CB attended a meeting and brought a publication.
• Friends of the Meadows and Bruntsfield Links: HM and DC attended, and reported that events appear likely to continue to be held on the Meadows, and to damage the grass.

15. The date of the next meeting will be 14th April 2010.
Bill Bruce, Licensing Dept., will attend. CB will chair the meeting in the absence of HM, and SM will act as secretary in the absence of DC.

Appendix to Item 4. Correspondence
PAPER
Letter from F Goodall (see 3 above)
Spokes Newsletter
Active Citizenship — Mind the Wealth Gap
City Development Consultation for JL

Papers at Nelson Hall
Inside Letting
Antisocial Behaviour Strategy
Castle Rock

EMAILS
Email from City of Edinburgh on Dealing with Disputes in Community Councils
List of Community Council Office Bearers
Fuel Poverty training event (sent on Feb. 10 for event on Feb. 23)

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