Parking in Mayfield High Street

There have been several complaints made to the Parish Council on the continual lack of parking available in Mayfield High Street. This includes on the double yellow lines where disabled blue badge holders are entitled to park. It is very apparent that residents and business owners are abusing the two-hour parking restriction and it has the knock on effect of dissuading visitors from using the services in the village centre. The Parish Council is appealing for residents and business owners to respect the double yellow lines and to adhere to the two hour parking restriction. There is often plenty of space in the car parks at the Memorial Hall – they really aren’t too far to walk from if you are able bodied and it would help the High Street to thrive.

Annual Parish Meeting Reminder

Your Annual Parish Meeting will be held in Mayfield Memorial Hall on 22 May 2017 at 19:30.This is not a council meeting but a meeting of the parish electors which has to, by law, take place between 1 March and 1 June each year. All electors are invited and can contribute to the agenda and debate current issues in the community so please come along and have your say. We have a talk on ‘Friends Against Fraud’ which will inform residents about how to protect themselves and vulnerable members of the community against fraud and scams. The meeting agenda will be issued on 10 May so any items you might like to discuss need to be sent in to the Parish Council office before that date.

Conservation Area Designation

As of 22nd March 2017, Wealden District Council resolved to approve the designation of new conservation area boundaries across the district. Five Ashes has a new Conservation Area and there is an extension to the existing Mayfield Conservation Area and the addition of a new one at Coggins Mill. The existing conservation area character appraisal documents no longer apply and will be replaced over the next two years with new comprehensive character appraisal documents. The Parish and Town Councils and Local History Societies will be consulted upon to comment on draft character appraisal documents, relevant to their area, prior to adoption.

With immediate effect, the new conservation area (CA) boundaries have been designated The statutory notification process as required by The Act relating to the designation of the boundaries will be undertaken as soon as possible (advertisement in the London Gazette and Local Newspapers).  There is no requirement in The Act for the Local Planning Authority to notify individual property owners affected by the designation of changes to existing boundaries, or the designation of new areas.

You can view the new conservation areas on the Parish Council website’s homepage: www.mayfieldfiveashes.org.uk The Parish Council will be notified of a future meeting to be held with Wealden District Council to discuss what conservation area designation means; the next steps of the conservation area project; Article 4 Directions; and Management Plans.

The East Sussex Joint Waste Partnership

The East Sussex Joint Waste Partnership has agreed a mutual exit with Kier in relation to its waste collection, recycling and beach cleansing services contract, with the contract now due to end on 28 June 2019. Kier has been delivering the services as part of the East Sussex Joint Waste Partnership since 2013. However, following significant change in the recycling market they have mutually agreed to end the contract but will continue to work together to provide a high quality service for residents and stability for their teams during the transition.

The four councils in the partnership save £3m a year and the average recycling rate has increased from 37 per cent to 40 per cent, an extra 1500 tonnes or 130 lorry loads a year. By the time the contract expires the councils will have saved circa £18m. The Eastbourne, Hastings, Rother and Wealden Councils will determine the way forward during 2017 to ensure the new service complies with legislative changes and provides the most economic and sustainable waste, recycling and street cleansing services before any procurement takes place.

Services will continue to be provided by Kier until the end of the contract in 2019. Residents will be able to continue to use the kerbside waste and recycling collection system as they currently do and should continue to recycle as much as they can.

Message from Action Fraud

Fraudsters are sending out a high volume of phishing emails to personal and business email addresses, pretending to come from various email addresses, which have been compromised. The subject line contains the recipient’s name, and the main body of text is as below:

“Hi, [name]!

I am disturbing you for a very serious reason. Although we are not familiar, but I have significant amount of individual info concerning you. The thing is that, most likely mistakenly, the data of your account has been emailed to me.

For instance, your address is:

[real home address]

I am a law-abiding citizen, so I decided to personal data may have been hacked. I attached the file – [surname].dot that I received, that you could explore what info has become obtainable for scammers. File password is – 2811

Best Wishes,”

The emails include an attachment – a ‘.dot’ file usually titled with the recipient’s name.

This attachment is thought to contain the Banking Trojan Ursniff/Gozi, hidden within an image in the document. The Ursniff Banking Trojan attempts to obtain sensitive data from victims, such as banking credentials and passwords. The data is subsequently used by criminals for monetary gain.

Street Learning

Street Learning, who provide FREE courses for anyone aged 19 or over from Wealden has announced a new programme for spring providing a fantastic opportunity for jobseekers and anyone wanting to learn a new skill. Bookings are made directly with the providers and some can be arranged at timings to suit you. For more information and to download the new programme, just search for Street Learning on the Wealden website, or request a copy by emailing streetlearning@wealden.gov.uk.

Topics include:

1. Improve your reading and/or writing skills
2. Improve your maths
3. IT for You
4. Cooking on a Budget
5. Creative writing
6. Introduction to Tablets
7. Future focus – CV writing skills
8. Sugarcraft Taster Session
9. The Key to Communication
10. Recognising your skills
11. Maths 4 Parents
12. Spring Walks
13. Gardening for Wellbeing
14. What to Expect at Work
15. Stress Management
16. Easy Cooking – Eat Well on a Budget
17. Furniture painting
18. Get outside and garden
19. Walk Leader Training
20. Dementia Friends Session
21. Improving your Photos
22. Skills for SAFER LIVING
23. Beginners Computer Course

A second runway for Gatwick?

You may think that the Gatwick second runway threat has gone away – but not quite yet!  The Government is at present consulting on the Draft Airports National Policy Statement which gives effect to the Heathrow runway decision.  Question 2 in the consultation asks people if they agree with the decision to choose Heathrow rather than Gatwick.

Four London Boroughs – Hillingdon, Richmond, Wandsworth and Windsor – have each allocated £50,000 to opposing the Heathrow decision, and they are asking their residents (nearly 1 million of them) to respond to the consultation by saying that the runway should be at Gatwick.  They are strongly supported by the Mayor of London. If you wish to comment you can send an email to: runwayconsultation@dft.gsi.gov.uk   All responses tend to get reduced to a statistical summary so a short email of one or two sentences is as good as a long essay. Responses need to be in before 25 May.

Wildlife in East Sussex

Roadside verges can provide a habitat for both common and rare species of animals.  There are currently approximately 120 selected verges across the county known as wildlife verges, which have been identified as having particular wildlife interests.  To help maintain these verges East Sussex County Council (ESCC) make sure that the vegetation is able to seed by only cutting the verges in late summer.  They are aware of the environmental benefits wildflower verges bring to the county and are looking into expanding the number of wildflower verges.  This year they will be running trial areas, where extra sections of grass verge will be left to grow allowing wildlife to develop.  If these areas are successful ESCC will look at creating more wildflower verges across the county.

Wealden Crematorium

Wealden District Council would like to keep residents, businesses and organisations informed about progress with the crematorium project. There is a webpage devoted to the project that now includes questions and answers about the project, general information about cremation, aerial footage of the site and a ‘Site Bulletins’ section (top left hand side of the page) where they are publishing updates about work on the crematorium site as it progresses.

This link will take you there: www.wealden.gov.uk/Wealden/Council/WealdenCrematorium

East Sussex county Council Elections:

Don’t forget that 4^th May is polling day!