To contact the Parish Plan Team call John Sweet 861604 or email plan@somerfordkeynes.org.uk consectetur deserunt fugiat.   © Somerford Keynes Parish Council and Contributors 2011-2 Page last updated 11 May 2012 The story earlier... Earlier Village Appraisals took place in 1991 and 2001 At the July 2011 meeting the proposed Village Emergency/Parish Plan was discussed. Two volunteers came forward at that stage. Christopher Cowcher of GRCC (Glos. Rural Community Council)  lead a meeting to decide what needs doing, and more importantly, how best to do it, on 8th August in the village hall. A further meeting was held in mid-September. At a meeting on 31st October, John Sweet (who chaired the 1991 appraisal team) was elected chairman of the steering group and Sheila Jones secretary. A core group then decided what should go into the plan, and reported back to a wider audience at a public meeting on Monday 12th December. The minutes of this meeting are here. The minutes include copies of the presentation slides. A further meeting was held on 24th January. As background papers the 1991 and 2001 Village Appraisals can be found on the History Group’s disk. The documents are too large to download here, however the chapters on Recommendations from these reports are available on the bars at the left.  A few paper copies of the 2001 Appraisal are available from the clerk. Further information on progress will appear here. Please contact the team if you wish to help/know more.   Neighbourhood Plans The Localism Act has introduced the concept of Neighbourhood Plans. These can apparently be at Parish or group of parishes level. How they might work is not yet clear, but new REGULATIONS covering this are published for consultation, which closed on 12th January. You might like to put forward your comments to the Parish council or the Parish Plan team. How about a Water Park plan with legal force? Community Assets. The Act also introduces the concept of Community Assets, which if defined beforehand, allow the Community the opportunity to buy them should they be offered for sale, e.g. shops, pubs, parklands. It is not yet clear how this might work, but do bear it in mind! The Parish Plan is coming together well and we would like to thank all those involved for their efforts so far. At this moment we are putting together the questionnaire following the coffee morning and a lot of inputs and ideas from a wide range of sources. The consultation process has been as wide as possible and this has resulted in some very good ideas and we are developing a unique approach targeted exactly on the Parishes needs using a format that will be understandable to every one. The questionnaire format will be different to that used here before and it has been well proven by the Gloucestershire Rural Community Council (GRCC) on several other Parish Plans. Using a well proven format and the GRCC processing capability does enable us to focus on the key point, asking the right questions in the right order. Once we are very near to the final form of the questionnaire it will be tested for use. There will also be an information table at the Somerford Keynes village fete on June 23^rd, and the current plan is to distribute the questionnaires week beginning 25^th June and they will be collected week beginning 9^th July. The distribution and collection is now being organised and the Emergency Plan questionnaire will be sent out at the same time. GRCC will then process the results and hand back to us the numerical results and completed forms so that the first draft of the plan can be put together and the written remarks incorporated. The scheduling for that part of the plan will be confirmed later. If there are any comments, questions or points you would like included please let us know at: plan@somerfordkeynes.org.uk  Again thank you to everyone for all the interest and help so far. John Sweet, Sheila Jones and the Parish Plan Team.