From the Chair October

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We realised at our October Parish Council meeting that there is something a “heritage theme” to our delivery priorities at the moment, including:

  • The provision of new signs bearing the sometimes-forgotten names of Grindleford pathways;
  • Work to restore the stone trough on SWHR;
  • The creation of a Grindleford archive;
  • Working with the War Memorials Trust to make some small but important refurbishments to our War Memorial.

All of these are important and I think right for us to support. People don’t want to live in just a group of houses, but in a distinctive community with a memory, and with stories to tell. As ever, on all of these things progress will take time, but we are moving forward on all fronts.

But we’re also looking to the future. We all hope there won’t be flooding over the next few months, but it’s great that we have two new and already-trained flood wardens. Our thanks to xx and yy for stepping forward. I went to the Derbyshire Association of Local Councils’ annual meeting at Pride Park last week, and the importance of flood wardens and village flood plans to the Environment Agency and the blue light services was made very clear.

I also – it was a busy week PC-wise – went to the National Park’s annual forum for Parish Councils in Bakewell on Saturday. The Park will soon be launching a consultation draft of the new Local Plan, following earlier preparatory discussions in which we participated (some of you will have come to the meeting we ran as a Parish Council earlier in the process). We’ll want to take a view on the approach to housing numbers suggested. Personally, I don’t think the Park’s current thinking is too far off, but there is a key issue to be resolved about the need for some open-market housing to make affordable housing feasible for developers. Let’s see what the final draft looks like.