Neighbourhood Plan
Open Meeting
Village Hall
Monday, 21st. September, 2015
5pm to 7.30pm.
The developers of the various prospective building sites around the village will be displaying and talking about their proposals.
WHAT IS THIS
NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN
ALL ABOUT?
We have announced that the Neighbourhood Plan for Okeford Fitzpaine is being restarted and have started to publish some of the future events and activities. But you must be asking yourself ‘why do we need a Neighbourhood Plan?’ and ‘why do I need to be involved?’
The answers to these questions are not straightforward, but people with busy lives and many time pressures need to have some explanation to justify any time they are being asked to spend contributing to a Neighbourhood Plan.
At the highest level Central Government want push an element of decision making down to the Local level and stop all decisions being taken on behalf of local people by Central Government, County and District authorities. Power to the people!
Bringing this closer to home, North Dorset District Council (NDDC) is producing a Local Plan for the period 2011-31 i.e. 20 years. Unless each Parish or Town Council in the District produces a Neighbourhood Plan, then NDDC will decide how that Parish/Town will develop over those 20 years. This is why our neighbours such as Shillingstone, Child Okeford, Iwerne Minster, Fontmell Magna as well as the 4 large towns of North Dorset are either already started, or have produced a Neighbourhood Plan.
Once produced and adopted NDDC will include Neighbourhood Plans in its own Policies for the 20 year period.
At a practical level, taking time to attend events and answer surveys will be your way of providing your ideas for how Okeford Fitzpaine will develop between now and 2031. How many houses do we want? Where to build them? Who should live in them? How do we improve the Parish? These are all questions that you will get the opportunity to influence by spending a few hours over the next 6 months.
At a purely financial level, an adopted Neighbourhood Plan will mean that the Parish can benefit from local housing development. NDDC proposes to charge the developer £45 per square metre of build space for any new housing. This is used by the Council for infrastructure costs e.g. road improvements. Up to 25% can be available to the Parish for its own ideas for improvements to infrastructure, but only if there is a Neighbourhood Plan. Otherwise NDDC decides how that money is spent across the whole District.
So, no Neighbourhood Plan no influence, we get what NDDC decide we should have, and we have no money to spend on our own ideas for improvements to the Parish.
We hope that this will help you decide to become involved by attending events and responding to our next survey.
Better still, volunteer for a role on the Neighbourhood Plan team by contacting:
George Weeks George @ sheephayes.co.uk
or
Beth Fox Beth @ bethfox.co.uk
or any other Parish Councillor
A meeting of the Neighbourhood Plan Group was held in the Pavilion on the Recreation Ground at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, 24th Feb; ten people attended.
Survey results were displayed at the Village Hall on 13th Feruary.
Click on the "LIBRARY" Tab on the left of your screen to see a summary (on the NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN shelf ).
See
https://www.okeford-fitzpaine.org/neighbourhood-plan-update/
There was also a Survey done in 1985, the results are on the NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN shelf in the LIBRARY, click on the Tab on the left of your screen. The survey was used to produce an "Appraisal" of the village, and this, too, is on that same in the Library, but only in text format, as the .pdf is too large. If you want a copy of the .pdf file (with pictures and maps), just ask [CONTACT US Tab].
AND
There is also the
Okeford Fitzpaine Parish Plan of 2010
Click on "Okeford Fitzpaine"
AND
At the Christmas Fayre held last year, comments were invited.
These are also in the "LIBRARY", on the NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN shelf.
This next "introduction"was posted a while ago - it has now been overtaken by events - the story continues beneath:-
OKEFORD FITZPAINE
NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN
QUESTIONNAIRE
The Planning System is changing. Under the new Localism Bill people are being encouraged to become more involved in deciding how their own communities should change and grow for the future.
Okeford Fitzpaine Parish Council needs YOUR help in drawing up a Neighbourhood Plan to establish a long term vision for the Parish to help influence planning policy, improve and retain local facilities, such as the shop/post office, the school, the Church, recreational facilities and local businesses.
You can help by completing a short questionnaire; just click on this Link:-
www.okeford-fitzpaine.org
Note that the Questionnaire is anonymous. If you care to send us a copy as well, we would be happy to include your answers (anonymously, of course!) on here.
Also on the NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN shelf in the LIBRARY (see tab on the left of your screen) is a file "peoples-comments-from-the-christmas-fayre.docx" which may interest you.
This is how we shall present any comments copied to us
In the Village Hall
Friday 13th February
6 - 9pm
Everyone was invited to come along and view the (anonymous) results from the
Neighbourhood Plan Questionnaire, and air their views whilst enjoying a Free glass of wine and nibbles.
Over 180 returns were received (compared with an Electoral Roll of about 900) giving some interesting views in respect of the future of the Okeford Fitzpaine Parish.
On display were the details of possible future plans along with information on the past and present times.
About a hundred people (of the 900 voters in the Village) turned up, and there was plenty of discussion. The results of the survey were posted up for all to see, and there was also a copy of the similar survey carried out in 1985 - and it was striking how similar they were !
Those responses have been "automatically" summarised, by simply searching for the number of occurences of some key words appearing in the answers received. The summaries are on this WebSite on the "Neighbourhood Plan" shelf in the "LIBRARY". There were effectively ten topics - the topics can be seen in a file called "Questions", and the original Questionnaire is in a file called "Questionnaire".
The responses to the Survey were to these ten questions :-
Q01. What do you like about the Parish?
Q02. What do you dislike about the Parish?
Q03. What types of housing do you consider are needed in the parish?
Q04. Do you consider that the Parish needs more employment? If so, what kind?
Q05. What do you consider are the main transport issues within the local area?
Q06. What do you consider are the main issues for pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders?
Q07. What do you consider are the main issues for people with disabilities?
Q08. Which community facilities do you consider very important / important / least important within the Parish?
Q09. Which community facilities or services do you think need improvement?
Q10. Any other comments?
Questions 03 and 08 resullted in graphs, with no text, so there are no such results for those questions - the results are simply figures in tables, that can be represented better in graphs.
Of all the keywords chosen, the one that was mentioned the most times was the word "shop". This does NOT mean that "everyone liked it" nor that "everyone hated it"; it simply means that it was the topic mentioned most. The word "Internet" was not mentioned at all - but the word "Broadband" was mentioned 15 times.
The 1985 Survey runs to 43 pages. It is on the "Neighbourhood Plan" shelf in the "LIBRARY".
