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Thursday 14 July 2016

Congratulation to the Town Hall Trust


 Congratulations to the Town Hall Trust and its Director Tracy Sullivan.  You can see from the attached press release that they have been awarded £90k from the Arts Council.  Transforming Trowbridge is committed to improving access to the arts in the town and the Trust is showing the way.
If you want to find out more
Please email info@trowbridgearts.com to join the mailing list for further information or visit www.trowbridgearts.com to find out more about current and future events, or call us on 01225 774306.
 
 
 
 
Trowbridge Town Hall Trust granted Arts Council funding

Trowbridge Town Hall Trust has been granted just over £99,000 from Arts Council England’s Grants for The Arts programme. This funding, along with that granted by Wiltshire Council and Trowbridge Town Council, will bring together the Town Hall development with the delivery of a professional performance, visual arts and arts and heritage learning programme. 

Following 4 years of development Trowbridge Arts and Trowbridge Town Hall Trust will come together to ensure the Town Hall is filled with inspiring exhibitions, performances and learning opportunities in arts and heritage. The Town Hall will remain the home of its 8 Studio Artists, the artists shop and many community groups who run their activities from it. Alongside the programme of events and activities that will happen in the venue, this funding will enable Trowbridge Town Hall to support other cultural organisations in the town to develop the arts offer out in the community.

Clare Jack, Chair of the Trowbridge Town Hall Trust explains, ‘ This is really wonderful news for the development of the Town Hall and for Trowbridge and the wider community. Whilst much has been achieved through Trowbridge Arts to date, bringing together the building and the activity is a really important step in ensuring a long term future for the Arts in Trowbridge, which in turn gives us a really strong base from which we can ensure the Town Hall gets the further investment it needs to continue to be a valuable asset for the community.’
A new season will begin in September with Arts Exhibitions continuing throughout the summer.

Wednesday 13 July 2016

Trowbridge Governance Review - Outcome


At the meeting of Wiltshire Council yesterday decisions were made on all of the proposals for boundary changes made by Trowbridge Town Council supported by Transforming Trowbridge as follows:

 ·         28 houses in Shore Place/Knigsley Place and Chepston Place on the Broadmead Estate should transfer from Wingfield to Trowbridge.
·         There should be no changes between Holt and Trowbridge at Ladydown Farm.
·         There should be no changes between Hilperton and Trowbridge at Wyke Road and through the Hilperton Gap.
·         259 houses, the pub, businesses, shops, Mead school and Community Centre in Paxcroft Mead to the South of the A361 and west of Ashton Road should transfer from Hilperton to Trowbridge.
·         105 houses in the Old Farm estate and the employment land north of the new Leap Gate extension, West Ashton Rd should transfer from West Ashton to Trowbridge.
·         There should be no changes between West Ashton and Trowbridge and between North Bradley and Trowbridge at The Ashton Park Urban extension, White Horse Business Park and Drynham Lane.

This last decision is very disappointing.  No doubt we will return to it another day



 




 
 

Monday 11 July 2016

Trowbridge Governance Review

Below is our submission to Wiltshire Council which will be made tomorrow.  Promoting an expansion of the boundaries of Trowbridge is one of our key priorities.

Transforming Trowbridge, a group of experienced private sector volunteers supported by the principal employers in the town, is working hard to attract investment and jobs into Trowbridge.  The outcome of this review is fundamental to our success.  If the town boundaries reflect the aspirations of the Core Strategy then your fundamental policy ambitions to make Trowbridge a strong and successful County Town will be achieved and we will have a well-resourced town council to meet the needs of the people living here.
We urge the Council to ignore the recommendations of the Working Group and resolve

-          That, in the absence of compelling evidence to the contrary land, allocated in the Core Strategy for the expansion of Trowbridge should be included within that town’s boundary as this will ensure community governance arrangements will better reflect local identities and facilitate effective and convenient local government which is the requirement set out in the Government’s Guidance
In particular

-          That the A350 represents a natural boundary between West Ashton Parish and Trowbridge

-          That Elizabeth Way represents a natural boundary between Hilperton and Trowbridge

-          That Trowbridge’s largest and most prestigious employment site, White Horse Business Park, is included within the town boundary

The Government Guidance and the wider strategic and policy issues seem to have been ignored and are barely referred to in the Working Party’s report on the Trowbridge review.  The principal reason for this review is brought about because of the decision of the Council to focus on Trowbridge as one of the three centres of population targeted for growth – not Hilperton, not West Ashton, not North Bradley etc etc.
The boundary extension is key (in these days of austerity)  to affording and developing sporting, health and well-being facilities for Trowbridge, joining up neighbourhoods to green spaces and corridors, allowing residents to connect with the surrounding countryside or town facilities without the need for cars.  Trowbridge, in the future will need to be more self-sufficient and this review offers a key opportunity to enable this to come about.

The conclusions of the Councillors on the Working Group have been reached without apparently taking these fundamental facts into consideration.  The Group seem to have been more focussed on parochial matters. 
At a consultation meeting I attended a councillor on the Working Group contradicted every contribution that he personally disagreed with. 

My own contribution on behalf of Transforming Trowbridge was criticised because we had a clear priority to press for an extension of the town boundaries and, therefore, we were biased. 

Apparently organisations with policy positions are not allowed to lobby for an outcome but it is OK for a Councillor with an agenda to be part of a so-called independent panel and promote the outcome he wants to see.

The Council’s strategic policies and Government Guidance have been largely ignored in the Councillors formulation of their recommendations in the report. That cannot be right.
Jeff Ligo
Director

Thursday 7 July 2016



Changes proposed to the Town Council boundary.

Trowbridge Town Council made proposals many years ago to Wiltshire Council to incorporate existing developments  at Broadmead, Paxcroft Mead and White Horse Business Park and proposed developments at Ashton Park in an expanded town boundary. 

Wiltshire Council has undertaken a Community Governance Review over the past two years and is due to make a decision at a meeting on Tuesday 12th July 2016.

The Agenda has now been published which you can access from the link below


Trowbridge Town Council has submitted the following questions to the meeting:



Questions to Wiltshire Council, 12th July 2016.

Question 1.
At the November Full Council meeting Councillor Alan Hill spoke very eloquently about the need for the Wiltshire councillors to be presented with the evidence in order for them to be able to make decisions on this important matter affecting the future of Wiltshire. In doing so, Councillor Hill made a very simple argument in favour of the decision which was then made at that meeting; that the Community Governance Review Working Party should give further consideration to a number of the proposed boundary changes. Councillor Hill and other Wiltshire Councillors as well as those of us also interested in this issue have waited eagerly for the evidence to be presented, for the evidence to be analysed and assessed and for the arguments in favour and against to be weighed up and a conclusion drawn from the evidence.
How can the Working Group believe that the Community Governance Review (Pending Schemes) report before the Council for consideration today presents the evidence in a clear, coherent and consistent way, supporting the conclusions which have been made in the recommendations contained in the report, in a way which Councillor Hill and others expected and in a way that such a report to the council should be presented, if it is to be taken at all seriously?

Question 2.
With regard to the recommendation at paragraph 8.31, let’s consider the evidence and see how clear, coherent and consistent it is.
Two pieces of evidence are cited in the report.
The first is the detailed submission from Trowbridge Town Council, (which presents the case for the proposals).
The second is the recognition by the Working Group that the area consists of ‘a mixture of areas where development had already been built out, areas that had allocations in the Core Strategy . . . and areas currently utilised for local employment.’ In paragraph 6, the report states that; ‘The Working Group has therefore taken into account any significant development including unimplemented planning permissions and any relevant allocations in the Wiltshire Core Strategy.’
This reflects the government guidance.
In addition the Working Group comments that; ‘Schemes 27 and 28 were natural progressions of the urban extension of Trowbridge from scheme 26 where the housing had already been built.’
Therefore all of evidence presented in the report supports the proposal.
On what clear, coherent and consistent basis does the Working Group justify ignoring the evidence to reach the conclusion that no action is taken?

Question 3.
With regard to the recommendations at paragraph 8.32 and 8.33/8.34, let’s consider the evidence and see how clear, coherent and consistent they are.
Three pieces of evidence are cited in paragraph 8.32 of the report.
The first is ‘that the response to the consultation showed the majority of respondents disagreed with the proposal.’
The second looks at access to the area and notes; ‘that the only access to this area was from Trowbridge’
The third looks at improving the boundary and notes ‘that the existing boundary was out of date and anomalous.’
Three pieces of evidence are cited in paragraph 8.33 of the report.
The first looks at access to the area and notes; ‘that access to this area of land was only possible via Trowbridge’
The second looks at improving the boundary and notes; ‘that the proposed boundary would be an improvement.’
The third is ‘that the response to the consultation was mixed’
On what clear, coherent and consistent basis does the working group justify ignoring the evidence from the consultation (in an area with 28 residential properties), giving significantly greater weight to access and improving boundaries in paragraph 8.32, yet at the same time ignoring the evidence relating to access and improving boundaries, giving significantly greater weight to the consultation (in an area with only three residential properties) in paragraph 8.33/8.34?

Question 4.
With regard to the recommendations at paragraph 8.35 to 8.38 and 8.39/8.40, let’s consider the evidence and see how clear, coherent and consistent they are.
Two pieces of evidence are cited in paragraphs 8.35 to 8.38 of the report.
The first is the improved boundary; ‘Scheme 22 reflected a more easily identifiable boundary’
The second is the response to the consultation at paragraph 8.36.
Only one piece of evidence is cited in paragraphs 8.39/8.40 of the report.
This is the outcome of the consultation, which was ‘strongly in favour of the proposal’.
On what clear, coherent and consistent basis does the working group justify ignoring the evidence relating to improving boundaries, giving significantly greater weight to the consultation in paragraph 8.35 to 8.38, yet at the same time ignoring the evidence from the consultation, in paragraph 8.39/8.40?

Question 5.
With regard to the recommendation at paragraph 8.45 to 8.48, let’s consider the evidence and see how clear, coherent and consistent it is.
Only one piece of evidence is cited in paragraphs 8.45 to 8.48 of the report.
This is the outcome of the consultation, ‘the majority of responses came from outside the area and were therefore less influential’.
In addition the report at paragraph 8.47 includes a statement from the parish council, with no balancing statement from the town council.
On what clear, coherent and consistent basis does the working group justify ignoring the only evidence they cite in paragraph 8.45 to 8.48, on the basis that the consultation is less influential because responses come from outside the area, when for Schemes 21, 23 and 103 they have completely ignored the views of respondents who live in the areas concerned? How does the Working Group justify the inclusion of statements from one side, statements which could be made equally about both alternative proposals? Surely the only conclusion to be drawn from the inconsistency, incoherence and lack of clarity is that the Working Group has yet again failed to provide evidence to justify its conclusions?


 

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