Neighbourhood Plan – Get involved!

The meeting on March 5th set out our general way forward.
The detail is currently being sorted as we look at how to best use the skills of the various volunteers but the likely outcome is 6 (or maybe 5) working groups plus a steering group.

The presentation made at the meeting is shown in accelerated form below.Even without the accompanying commentary it gives some idea of the proposed way forward.

Most volunteers have said what they are able to do. If you haven’t but you want to play a part in shaping the future of our village then get in touch whether it’s to seek membership of a working group or just to offer general help.

The proposed working groups are:

Houses and landscape
Utilities and flooding
Business and Economy
Traffic and travel
Recreation, health and leisure
Education

The final session consisted of time discussing some of the ideas and also how to extend the engagement of the village.These are in no way agreed or approved -they are just off-the-top-of-the head suggestions from people at that meeting.

Comments	First thoughts …
Young people – Investigate possibility of projects to identify what students most like and dislike about the village, whether there are ways to improve it, can they create a young people’s questionnaire.	Education Working Group Needs to liaise with schools
Can young people be persuaded to help parents or grandparents answer online questionnaires?	Look at when we get closer to questionnaire time.
Can we get some form of representation of young people on working groups or steering group?	Discuss – maybe the input would follow from 1 above
Can school ‘sixth form’ age pupils contribute to aspects of design of ‘branding’ materials for Bloxham?	Discuss
Will we engage with other local villages likely to be affected by the outcomes of our Plan or local villages undertaking their own plan.	Links already made with some. Parish Council to keep this on the agenda.
If there is yet more expansion the is there land / demand for a proper sized village Hall even if it meant sacrificing one or more of the existing halls to fund it? St Mary’s is looking to create what will be a very large community space.	Needs to be part of the discussions by the Recreation W.Gp. but funding this big would only follow from quite extensive new developments
If there is yet more expansion should we be looking at encouraging provision of general shopping from somewhere that has less hazardous parking?	The Traffic W Gp. needs to seriously look at this along with the ownership and better use of the space outside the shops.
Should we have a separate website dedicated specifically to the Neighbourhood Plan? butThe Parish Council and the Broadsheet online already provide NP coverage.	Will people visit a third site or will more people see information on a site that already gets 7000 hits/month?Steering group to decide and cost.
Neighbourhood Plan needs a mission statement to avoid mis-selling. It can’t halt development but it can stop inappropriate development and fix a cap on numbers.	Need to create something before BloxFest
Neighbourhood Planning can shape how any developer funds are spent to improve recreation fields and community spaces.	Recreation W Gp. need to engage the sports clubs and the many clubs that use spaces to formulate questions.