Beach Hut Threat

Here we go again! Despite the massive support for the Village Green application, and the clear message that Herne Bay wants the Downs unspoilt, the Council is thinking of putting up beach huts. See: http://bit.ly/koHs08

Village Green for Herne Bay

The Village Green application that will protect The Downs forever (if it succeeds) has finally made it to the front of the queue. Kent County Council have advertised the application in the Kentish Gazette, thus starting the 6 week consultation period. An impressive 1,181 people have taken the trouble to sign witness statements saying they want The Downs to be a village green. It's probably the largest village green application that KCC has ever received.

We now need to persuade Canterbury City Council to give us our village green. If they support the application, we could have our village green in a matter of weeks. If they fight the application, it could drag on for years, and we may never get our village green. Click here to find out how you can help Herne Bay get the village green we want.

Relocation

The Save Our Downs blog is upping sticks and scampering off to HerneBayMatters.com, a new website of my own concoction, where it will be able to snuggle up to assorted other campaigns, hobbyhorses and bonnet-bound bees. In NewBizSpeak, the critical mass will synergistically trigger tipping points. In English, it may be a good way of getting things done.

HerneBayMatters.com is about, for, and by Herne Bay. The aim of the new site is to:

• celebrate the great, good and quirky things that our town has to offer, and to make that information readily available to all the people who live here, and everyone who visits
• highlight the things that need fixing, improving, or stopping
• provide a contact point and discussion forum for anyone with ideas and actions that will help with either of the above.

Click on the link, have a look around and let me know what you think.

Best regards,

Phil

A spring in your step

Yes, folks, the pages have been flying off the calendar and it's time for another Bounds of The Downs walk. This one celebrates The Downs as winter turns to spring.

The Spring (or Vernal) Equinox apparently happens at exactly 17:32 on the 20th March this year, and the Bounds of The Downs traditionally happens on the nearest Sunday, so Sunday 21st March is the day, starting from the King's Hall at 10am.

Back by popular demand will be the Quizzical Treasure Trail, complete with (wait for it, wait for it!) a complementary commemorative pencil for the early birds. Gosh! Gasp! You feel loved and pampered now, don't you?

The plan is to go clockwise, starting from the King's Hall. The full tour of The Bounds of The Downs is about 3¼ miles, but there are shorter routes. The red shortcut, up the Hundred Steps, brings it down to a very manageable 1¼ miles. The yellow shortcut, up the slope leading to The Lees makes a 1¾ mile circuit.

The long-range weather forecast is mild and dry, so come along and enjoy The Downs and the start of Spring.

Beach: cleaner

A motley crew of hardy local volunteers scoured the shoreline by The Downs, Herne Bay last Sunday in a regular beach clean and rubbish survey. It was pure happenstance that we weren't out the previous week, when we would have been drenched and frozen in a howling north-easterly. As it was, we had a lovely bright morning - "brilliant blue sunshine" as my Gran would say.

Unsurprisingly, picking up all this crap changes (or perhaps just hardens) my opinion of rubbish and rubbishers. Crisp bags are evil. Ever wondered how it is that crisps can stay crunchy for months in the bag, but soggify within hours of exposure to real life? The answer, my friend, is blowing along our beaches. Crisp bags are made of some kind of micro-engineered multi-layer laminate that (a) would put NASA to shame, and (b) is as impervious to the forces of Nature as an artefact from an alien civilisation. If you seek immortality, just print your name on a bloody crisp bag.

Cotton buds: bastard little things. For reasons that escape me, some people automatically flush their used cotton buds down the loo. The filtering systems in the sewage works are, of course, designed with turds and turdlets in mind. The cotton buds fly like miniature safety javelins through the grills and meshes, and down the pipes to the open sea. The cottony ends obligingly disintegrate, but the little plastic sticks just bob around forever. There's millions of them all round the British coast, simply because people don't have the wit to bin them rather than flushing them. If there are bio-degradable cotton buds with wooden or cardboard sticks, they should be compulsory.

Apparently, ships sailing out of Tilbury are major culprits for littering the sea, and not just with cotton buds and crisp bags - I'm guessing the plastic cutlery is theirs. I am reliably informed by wise seadogs that it's standard practice for ships in port to use a large oil drum or two as an all-purpose rubbish bin, and then empty the lot overboard as they leave the estuary for the open sea. Scumbags.

It's like pulling hen's teeth

Apologies for the mixed metaphor, but getting a straight answer out of CCC is slow and painful, and results are few and far between. Here's a case in point: the forces of Mordor (aka Canterbury City Council) have fixed their beady little eyes on a slice of The Downs, with a view to turning a fast buck. Before they can start developing it, they had to strip it of its Public Open Space status, even though it's in a ward which their own Open Spaces analysis describes as having a dearth of recreational open space. What they overlooked in their unseemly dash for cash was national Planning Policy Guideline 17 (PPG17), which requires them to identify and supply suitable replacement land.

An inquisitive local resident wrote to Cllr Vickery-Jones, who is the portfolio holder for foreshore, beaches and beach huts:

When will the Council (finally) start addressing its responsibility to provide a suitable and matching replacement for the land it stripped of Public Open Space designation over a year ago? (A duty under PPG17.)

And this is what came back:

This question is interesting as it raises issues such as proportionality. To explain that I must tell you that in my view Councillors have a duty to act without regard for the ballot box, of course they carry an obligation to listen to all residents but they also have a duty to look at the needs of other residents who do not normally raise their voices until the opportunity is lost. I do not and will not ever let people down because I have not been robust in exploring any and all opportunities to improve the ability of Herne Bay to thrive again, even though I am criticised for it. How anyone can ever take the view that this proposal is anything but good for our town, frankly is beyond me.


Our town where 70p in every £1 is spent elsewhere, where our kids can't stay because there is little work and where the average wage is £11,000. Who can possibly live on that? My daughter is 14, you may well have young people in your family, where is their future?  I have a duty to provide for their needs as well, as best I can.


I am aware that there are quite a few people who have signed a petition against this proposal, however I am also aware that there has been many scare stories circulated which did not provide the full picture. The Downs have never been under threat from this proposal, no one has ever played cricket or football on the area in question nor has any one flown a kite or even walked their dog unless they suffered being torn to bits by the brambles, the cliff is subject to movement which is the reason that very large rain water drains are installed in that particular area. In all this area is totally unsuitable for any of the activities claimed and would only sustain temporary and light structures such as Beach Huts.


Lib Dem Rob Bright stood shoulder to shoulder with me in the local paper because this matter was never 'Political' it was always about what was perceived as being the best for all of Herne Bay. We have the same passion for Herne Bay as you obviously do, we only differ in that you can afford to be very 'local' whereas we councillors cannot, simply because we have to take a 'broader' view, such as what is good for the whole town.


You state that you are an independent individual which gives me some hope that you may take an objective view and with that some better understanding of the issues.


These are entirely my personal views and should be considered in that light, they give a true and accurate of the way I see the matter. if I can assist you further please do not hesitate to contact me, my only request is that you do not ask the same questions as I have answered these, using the sum total of my knowledge.

 Load of cock, if you ask me.

Easy as 1, 2, 3!

Just when you thought it couldn't get any better! This winter's Bounds of The Downs walk will feature a quizzical treasure trail, concocted by the mischievous and maverick minds at Campaign HQ. The puzzles around the treasure trail range from just counting things (hopefully the right things!) to head-scratching brain-teasers, so there's something for all ages, and all the answers will be right in front of your eyes.

Up for grabs is a complimentary family ticket to Wildwood (kindly donated by the lovely people at the Wildwood Trust), so come along and have a great time, and you might just win yourself another!

The Bounds of The Downs

Borrowing from the tradition of beating the bounds of a parish, walking The Bounds of The Downs is an opportunity to appreciate The Downs from every angle. Walking the Bounds will happen on the Sunday nearest each solstice and equinox, so that we also get to appreciate The Downs throughout the year.

The plan is to go clockwise, starting from the King's Hall. The full tour of The Bounds of The Downs is about 3¼ miles, but there are shorter routes. The red shortcut, up the Hundred Steps, brings it down to a very manageable 1¼ miles. The yellow shortcut, up the slope leading to The Lees makes a 1¾ mile circuit.

The first Bounds of The Downs will be on Sunday 20th December 2009, starting from the King's Hall at 10am. Feel free to start from the beginning, or anywhere along the Bounds. If the weather is filthy, stay indoors - this is supposed to be for fun! - as there'll be another chance later: 

• Sunday 21st March 2010
• Sunday 20th June 2010
• Sunday 19th September 2010
• Sunday 19th December 2010

Councillors break oath of silence

There's much rib-tickling japery in the current HB Times on Page 1 and Page 3. I'm tempted to start up a TV show called "Councillors say the funniest things" which would feature elected representatives trying to keep a straight face while spouting nonsense, distortions, half-truths, non sequitors and unsupported assertions. Some of our guys must be up to national standard.

Except for the current plans for The Downs, which the CCC Executive Committee made CONFIDENTIAL in July. Cllr Vickery-Jones sits on that Committee. He voted to make these plans CONFIDENTIAL, yet he now insists there are no secret plans. "There are no secret plans" - says the man who made the current development plans CONFIDENTIAL! If the plans aren't secret, would Cllr Vickery-Jones release them to the HB Times for publication, or put them on display in the Council Offices in Herne Bay? Or maybe there's a subtle distinction between 'secret' and 'confidential' that I'm missing.

First I've heard of this, although the Council did try to pull this stunt sometime in the 1960s, so I'm told. This may be nothing more than a straw man, that they put up just to knock down.

Obviously, it would be easier to get more facts if the Executive (which includes Cllr Vickery-Jones) hadn't made them all CONFIDENTIAL. Neither Councillor actually identifies any of the 'misinformation' they say has been spread. There is no misinformation on the leaflet, just facts.

Oh, how I laughed! We have spoken to ALL the Councillors at least once. In January 2009 we were in email contact with Cllr Vickery-Jones, when we had to explain to him exactly where the beach huts going to be sited - on the grassy slopes, not the concrete path as he had mistakenly thought. So much for getting your facts straight! Just to straighten up a few other facts: as well as the email exchange (available at your request) with Cllr Vickery-Jones, there was at least one lengthy phone call in January 2009; we have presented a speech and 135-signature petition to full Council; we have twice addressed the Executive Committee (Cllr Vickery-Jones was present on both occasions); and we have fruitlessly asked for information from Council officers, who were gagged by the Executive's CONFIDENTIALITY order.

This isn't about beach huts, it's about saving The Downs.

What's got so many people in Herne Bay so riled is that the Council even thinks it can touch The Downs. Cllr Vickery-Jones is right about the legal covenants - they say that The Downs must be kept as an open space and pleasure ground for all the people of Herne Bay forever. So why has the Council even started de-designating bits of it?

This the Council's current favourite cover story for the development - it's replacing or reinstating the wooden beach huts that were there before. Oops! The earlier beach huts were in breach of the legal covenants on the land. They were illegal. The proposed beach huts would also be illegal. It would be a repeat offence!

N.B. All snippets were snipped from the Herne Bay Times 16th September 2009, front page and page 3.

Open to Interpretation

Wouldn't you know it? Nothing for ages, and then a flurry. Canterbury City Council have finally produced their Draft Open Spaces Strategy, and a rattling good read it is.

Section 5 has some good stuff in it:

Sage words. Fine words. Dear reader, imagine my consternation and disappointment when I found this, tucked away in a far distant Appendix:

Despite the King's Hall slopes and The Downs being 'existing open spaces', CCC are proposing to develop some kind of 'interpretation project', defeating the aims and objectives of their declared Strategic Vision. I must admit to being somewhat mollified by this proposal being equal 14th in a prioritised list of 17 to be spread over the next 5 years. Time enough, I thought rashly, to persuade CCC of their folly. Hey ho.

On the Agenda for the CCC Executive's meeting for the 30th July, a frustratingly secret item:The standard excuse for excluding the press and public from the sausage-making ugliness of Councillors in action is that there is some kind of commercial confidentiality at stake. (Remind me, whose money is it that they're spending?) So what's going on?

In the beginning, so rumour has it, A Developer approached A Councillor and convinced her/him that The Downs was ripe for development. Said Councillor presented the idea to the Council. The Hive-mind cried "Desist! The constraints of good governance, that chafe us so, compel us to solicit competitive bids - this cannot be seen to be a stitch-up or shoo-in!".

There was some hasty tendering, and all looked set fair to continue as originally planned. Oops! Local irritants highlighted the illegality of breaching the covenants on the land. CCC's legal advisers told them all was well. The Irritants pointed out that they were mistaken. Everything went quiet, supposedly while the legal position was examined more closely. Suddenly, the proposal re-surfaces, although shrouded in secrecy.

My interpretation is:

• through poor legal advice, or sheer bravado, or blind greed, CCC has convinced itself that commercial development of The Downs is not illegal;
• they have received proposals that they believe circumvent the restrictions stated in the legal covenants that came with the land when it passed to them;
• CCC will want to impose their preferred bidder, regardless of the legality, or the local opposition.
  

I look forward to finding out exactly how My Council proposes to spend My Money, defiling My Town. Personally, I believe that Councillors who wilfully pursue an illegal course of action should be responsible for any and all costs that arise. Once upon a time, they would have been - it was called surcharging.
.:.

Instant torpor

Dear reader, how I have missed our little tête-à-têtes. Or more strictly speaking, doigts-aux-yeux, but that sounds much less cosy. There has been a deathly quiet from the general direction of Canterbury City Council's Lethal and Demagogic Dept. But I have news! There will be nothing happening for a little bit longer. Officially.

I was so twirled by the giddying pace of events I had to sit down and do some calming maths.

From the moment I reared my ugly head and warned CCC that there were covenants on the land they wanted to misuse, to the time a memo appeared from Legal & Democratic Services saying everything was fine, took a grand total of SEVEN DAYS. This exemplifies the speed of mind and action that I am pleased to see from the (public) lawyers I am funding with my Council Tax. Not single-handedly funding in their entirety, I accept, but there's got to be a couple of legal pads with my name on.

But now, a disappointing contrast. It's been SEVENTY-FIVE days since Mrs Activist and I put the frighteners on the Executive by explaining that they were dabbling on the fringes of criminality. For 2½ months the Execs have been drifting inexorably towards a life of ASBOs, glue-sniffing, electronic tags, incomprehensible street slang and drab ill-fitting hoodies while the lawyers just stand by and watch. It makes me feel so helpless. Is there nothing we can do to save these rough diamonds from the downward spiral that starts with property crime and ends with the electric chair blanket?

My trusty informant tells me that there is little or no chance of the proposed East Cliff Annexation being dealt with before the next Executive meeting on June 8th, ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-THREE days after their second written warning. Please, please, would someone from L&D Services put the Westgate Eight straight before they blot their copybooks and blight their futures through a silly high-spirited mistake?

.:.

Patience is a virtue

Eight weeks ago the Executive were alerted to their imminent criminality. I replaced my blood with espresso to ready myself for the frenetic pace of their response. They wondered. Legal pondered. Time dragged. I could have saved myself a fortune in coffee bills: I should have got some decent time-lapse photography kit.

From which you will have gathered that not a lot has happened. But I am neither perturbed nor dismayed, because I went to The Great Exhibition at the King’s Hall. CCC treated us to their vision of our future, in the form of the Area Action Plan. This consists of 10 objectives, the last (but by no means least) of which focuses on their conservation credentials and environmental ambitions:

“Located to the East of Herne Bay town centre are sites of exceptional importance in respect of rare, endangered or vulnerable natural habitats and species within a European context. They consist of Special Areas of Conservation (SAC) that seek to protect wild fauna and flora and Special Protection Areas (SPA) which seek to protect wild birds.”

Joy of joys! A clear and simple reason not to allow private development of public open space. If they’re half-way serious about this, there’s absolutely no need to involve lawyers (always a good thing). Instead, we can all just concentrate on the fact that we’ve got an accessible piece of semi-wild land that should be conserved. I’ve been finding out about Duncan Down in Whitstable – seems to be a very good model to work from.

As my spell-checker confirms: hop sprigs eternal in the hum an beast.

.:.

Interlude

Well, with a bit of luck and a following wind, we may be getting hints of activity over the coming week. Just maybe. The Executive will be huddling on Thursday week (2nd April), so I should find out this week whether CCC's lean, mean legal machine has decided on the legality of the bonkers proposal.

Until that glad day arrives, do skip over to have a peek at some of the other things that have been sporadically hijacking what's left of my attention:

• PlanesOverHerneBay a sturdy and increasingly plausible stand against (in descending order): planes needlessly flying over Herne Bay, when they could easily divert out to sea; unrestrained and unmonitored increase in flights through Manston; local democracy being played like a puppet by commercial interests.

• KentAndKentish a long-term, ongoing survey of the stuff I like about Kent, starting with the things my tastebuds like about Kent.

.:.

WBC: boxing clever

No, not the World Boxing Council, the Whitstable Beach Campaign. Plenty of sweat and tears, but much less blood. There's a delightfully lucid explanation of a complex situation on the front page of their site which describes the rather odd way Whitstable meets the sea. WBC have dedicated themselves to:

safeguarding Whitstable's beaches for the enjoyment of the public by protection against commercial development.

Keen followers of this blog will have pounced on the spooky parallels to what we're trying to achieve here on The Downs: keeping the space both open and public.

One of their founders, whom I shall refer to as "N" in order to create an air of mystery, invited us over to plot and seethe over mugs of tea. Very useful, heartening and fun. (As an aside, I must say that this really isn't how I ever expected to be spending my time - more on this another day, perhaps.) If I can get cracking on half the things we covered, this campaign will be broader, deeper, more polished, and hopefully more effective.

Stay tuned.

.:.

A little bird told me...

...well, Graham Finch (my favourite Democracy Services Officer at CCC) told me: the Executive can't yet make a recommendation to Council about the beach huts, because they don't have a report from their legal boffins. The Executive next meet on 2nd April - with luck we may have both activity and progress by then.

The law does grind exceeding slow. I hope it turns out exceeding fine. Fingers crossed. 

.:.

Muse. Um.

Here’s a very British gem: the Herne Bay Museum (link).

Fearless and fervent, my woman and I swarmed into the Museum to see what we could find out about The Downs of yesteryear. The place is a treasure trove! If you haven’t been recently, pop in and saunter around. From fossil teeth to bouncing bombs, they’ve got all sorts of goodies on permanent display. There are also temporary exhibitions - all the ones I’ve seen have been well worth a good peer. Currently it's 'Inventions', with a few kids’ own ideas: “a friendly robot to bring me sweets”.

Met up with Craig Bowen who looks after the tardis-full of stuff filed upstairs, like a collie looks after a flock of sheep. He’s actually divided between several museums, with Canterbury getting the lion’s share of him (hope we get the useful bits!). Enthusiastic and very helpful, as was the nice lady on the front desk.

There’s an almost magical, other-worldly, time-slip quality about the archives, as seems to happen when the present is dedicated to the past, so it didn't seem out of place when a paternal Victorian figure stepped through the mist of time into our little tardis, brooding and reserved. He looked like someone's long-lost great-uncle Septimus, and muttered 'pas devant les enfants', so we took the hint and scarpered.

I like the Museum a lot. It's a delightful and poignant venture, burnished by the care and love invested in it, and handsomely repays the time you spend there. Long may it thrive and prosper. I would hate to see it fall prey to the unthinking short-term destructive greed that was directed at the Visitor Information Centre. For instance.

.:.

Sausage revival

Disappointing. Unsurprising. Recoverable.

CCC voted down the opportunity to flaunt themselves as 21st century cyber-starlets (see Radio Sausage). The world is a marginally less glitzy place as a result.

More to the point, they voted down the opportunity to let their constituents see them in action. Internet access is becoming much more widespread, and is almost universal among the 'young' (anyone who runs for a bus). These are the very people who must be engaged in the democratic process if we are to stand the slightest chance of not going down the constitutional toilet, as a district, a county and a nation.

In the hope it will make some difference, I am emailing ALL the Councillors a link to the Radio Sausage post, in which I offer to prop up Western democracy single-handed. With luck, we may get some interesting and productive comments.

Councillors: I mean it. I am very worried that you have become so enmeshed in process, procedure and petty politics that you have lost sight of your purpose. You must actively seek out, and then represent, the wishes of your constituents. This takes involvement and commitment from everyone. There is an absolute need for widespread involvement in a vibrant and transparent local democracy.

You won't earmark a few tens (or hundreds?) of pounds to increase accessibility and participation.

Out of a budget of millions.

That is shameful.

.:.

Unshriven

Godless spawn that I am, I failed to gorge on pancakes yesterday.

To make up for it, I shall give up Easter eggs for Lent.
.:.

Mappa Monday

Dear Reader, give yourself a treat and check out this map. It is jam-packed with facts and fun.

Just the other day, I quizzed CCC about the Herne Bay Conservation Area. I had heard people (well, estate agents) talking about it, but had no clear idea of where exactly it was. Quick as a flash One-Of-Those-Planning-People came back with a couple of great links. One of them links to this excellent map of the Canterbury District Local Plan. The left hand side of the screen explains how it all works.

This is a detailed, zoomable map of the whole CCC fiefdom, showing conservation areas, cycle routes, flood zones, offices nodes (huh?), ancient monuments, open spaces, regeneration zones, etc, etc. There's an associated Local Plan document that spells it all out in words of English. Words, pictures - whatever works for you.

I don't know if every District Council has one of these maps, or if CCC are blazing a trail. If it's the latter, congratulations, people: a great piece of mapping.
.:.

Radio Sausage

A few ounces of reconstituted tree, shaped into a local freesheet, thump to the floor. The crisp metal edge of the letterbox snaps back into place, briefly trapping a small fleshy obstruction. The pain-numbed child continues its paper round.

This is what passes for effective communication in 21st century Kent.

But things are looking up: I read in that very freesheet that one of our elected representatives (Cllr Perkins) seems to have 'the vision thing' (article). He has proposed that Council meetings be recorded and broadcast on the internet, arguing this would encourage greater engagement in local politics - I approve. Anyone who actually gives a toss could listen live, or any time later that suits them. They wouldn't have to get themselves to whichever Council meeting place at whatever (more or less inconvenient) time of day.

Cllr Perkins accurately predicted that other Councillors would oppose the idea. Cllr Gilbey is quoted as saying "My personal view is that I wouldn't want to give the opportunity for grandstanding in front of cameras or recorders."

I may be warming to Cllr Gilbey's sense of humour: the idea that the mere presence of a microphone or webcam would transform Council into a casting session for Chicago! just makes me chuckle. On my one exposure to Council I observed:

• very little excessive or unnecessary expenditure of effort
• peer and group pressure to conform
• many conventions and procedures to curtail or restrict Councillor participation
• only about 5% egomania

This is not an ideal nursery for 'grandstanding' prima donnas. And they're limited to three minutes each, anyway.

The dark voices in my head tell me that some Councillors oppose this move towards greater transparency for bad reasons: embarrassed by what they say, or by how little they say; wanting to lay claim to non-existent protests and challenges; not wanting their words to be remembered too precisely; not wanting to be seen as a low-budget part-time imitation of Parliament at its braying worst; and so on.

The saying goes that law-making and sausage-making are not pleasant to witness. The proposed internet broadcast would be like listening to sausages being made (every one a sizzling banger, hopefully). It might set your teeth on edge. It might send you to sleep. It might play havoc with your blood pressure. But if it gets more people more involved, and makes more Councillors more responsive, it will be worth every penny.

If CCC 'doesn't have the money for this sort of thing' as Cllr Gilbey is reported as saying, I am more than happy to discuss digging into my own pocket to help make it happen. Any Councillors wanting to take me up on this kind offer can contact me via the Comments below.
.:.