Owlerton Southey Green Area Panel Minutes 15th July 2004
OWLERTON/SOUTHEY GREEN AREA PANEL | ||||
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Meeting held 15th July, 2004, 2004 at Foxhill Primary School, Keats Road | ||||
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PRESENT: | Councillors Tony Damms (Chair), Leigh Bramall and Ibrar Hussain. | |||
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| Officers in attendance:- | |||
| Andy Wier | - | Area Action Co-ordinator | |
| Maggie Birt | - | Sport and Community Recreation | |
| Dawn Young | - | Sport and Community Recreation | |
| Val Hughes | - | Sheffield Libraries | |
| Andy Cain | - | Committee Secretariat | |
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15 members of the public attended the meeting including community representatives and Panel Partners. | ||||
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1. | APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE | |||
| Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Vic Bowden, Gill Furniss and Chris Weldon. | |||
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2. | INTRODUCTIONS | |||
| Councillor Tony Damms, the newly appointed Chair of the Area Panel, introduced himself and fellow members of the Panel and paid tribute to the work undertaken by Councillors Doreen Newton and Mark Wilde during their respective periods as Chair of the Panel in 2003/2004. | |||
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3. | NORTH SHEFFIELD PRIMARY CARE TRUST | |||
| Gary McCulloch, Health Development Manager, North Sheffield Primary Care Trust, gave a presentation regarding the work of the Trust, whose main aim was to improve the health of the people in the area. The Trust was responsible for 21 General Practices and served around 140,000 people. Statistics highlighted the fact that the inhabitants of the Trust area experienced high levels of ill health. In response, the Trust worked to ensure that individuals could obtain high quality treatment whilst developing measures to prevent illness and promote good health. | |||
| Mr. McCulloch made particular reference to initiatives in the area which included the NHS Live Project, the employment of additional nurses for older peoples services, school nurses and a health clinic for children and young people at Southey. A substance misuse awareness day was to be held on 29th July, 2004. The latest Primary Care Trust news brochure was circulated together with a leaflet giving more details of the Trust’s Public Health and Community Development Team. | |||
| Members of the public asked questions and received responses regarding community facilities in Foxhill, the future of the area beyond the stock clearance programme and the problems being experienced by residents with regard to the delays with the stock clearance programme across the whole of the Panel area. | |||
| The Panel noted (a) the information given by Gary McCulloch; and | |||
| (b) that Councillor Leigh Bramall was to arrange a meeting with key partners regarding the problems being experienced in respect of the delays with the stock clearance programme. | |||
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4. | GETTING OWLERTON AND SOUTHEY GREEN ACTIVE | |||
| Dawn Young and Maggie Birt circulated a copy of a Plan to encourage the people of Owlerton and Southey Green to become more physically active through play, sport and exercise. | |||
| Maggie Birt gave details of the aims of the Plan which were to get all the agencies acting in a co-ordinated manner, establish what activity was taking place, co-ordinate the activity effectively, make better use of existing resources and attract new resources in order to achieve the overall aim of significantly increasing the level of sport and physical activity in the area, particularly amongst those who were currently the least active. | |||
| Statistics supported the need for people to become more active, as physical inactivity was a major cause of premature death, with only 30% of people in the Panel area achieving the minimum levels of activity required. The Plan’s target was to increase the numbers of people reaching the minimum levels of activity by 1% per year with the priority being to work with least active young people and adults. Key proposals included promoting the benefits of physical activity, producing a local physical activity directory, encouraging ‘Activators’ to give guidance, supporting and training others, developing social networks, developing more activity in schools, promoting everyday walking, developing key priorities, ensuring that the current feasibility studies in relation to the parks projects followed the key principles to support physical activity and giving consideration to affordability issues. It was intended to establish an implementation group to oversee these proposals. | |||
| Appended to the Plan was a map of the Panel area showing key facilities, details of what was taking place in the area and a contact list. Also available were brochures setting out details of the summer sport and play that was available for young people across the City during the school holidays which included sports van sessions at Colley Park on Wednesday’s between 28th July and 25th August. | |||
| 15 people volunteered to participate in a pilot initiative to measure their level of physical activity by using pedometers which were issued by Dawn Young. | |||
| The Panel thanked Dawn Young and Maggie Birt and noted the Plan and information reported. | |||
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5. | CO-ORDINATION OF LOCAL HEALTH ISSUES – HEALTHY LIVING PARTNERSHIP & THE HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE THEME GROUP | |||
| Dave Carr gave a presentation on the work being undertaken by the Healthy Cross Community Project, which was a registered charity, aiming to create a diverse resource to bring about health improvements and social change across the Foxhill and Parson Cross areas. The Project had a volunteer management committee and Dave Carr indicated that more volunteers would be welcomed, including elected members. | |||
| The Project supported local residents on issues which were important to them, helped to set up groups and operate them, developed and managed local projects, worked with service providers to improve services in the area, supported community members to become more involved in local decision making, encouraged networking between local groups and organisations and played a leading role in the North East Healthy Living Partnership (HeLP). HeLP had been set up as a co-ordinating organisation for all health and social care related activities and services in the Panel area. | |||
| Dave Carr also referred to the important work being undertaken by the Southey and Owlerton Regeneration Board’s Health and Social Care Theme Group. | |||
| Healthy Cross were involved in many initiatives including a “Buddies Scheme” to involve and recruit local people to support others to access activities and training, a development and health training course, a drama group for adults and children and a Men’s Health Project. There was also a Trainee Development Workers Scheme for people to develop their skills and experience to enable them to realise their potential into paid employment, training or community activity and assistance given in setting personal health improvement targets, whether that be to exercise more, stop smoking or eating healthier. | |||
| The Panel thanked Dave Carr and noted the information reported. | |||
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6. | THE WOLFE ROAD PROJECT AND THE FOXHILL HEALTHY LIVING CENTRE | |||
| Jo Ritson, manager of the Wolfe Road Project, with effect form June, 2004, indicated that as Project Manager, she was responsible for looking after the existing building on Wolfe Road that contained the Foxhill and Parson Cross Advice Centre, Foxhill and Birley Carr Live at Home Scheme, Foxhill Forum, IT Learning Suite and Surestart Nursery and overseeing the building of a Healthy Living Centre (HLC) on Wolfe Road, with building expected to commence early in 2005. The HLC was a partnership project involving the Foxhill Medical Centre, Healthy Cross and Foxhill Forum. The Centre would contain a health centre and chemist and its ethos would be about promoting good health and would include facilities for alternative therapies, exercise activities, a healthy food café and a garden. | |||
| Clair Liversidge, Specialist Health Development Nurse at the Foxhill Medical Centre, indicated that her role included the development of healthy activities and providing support to local groups. A woman’s health and relaxation group had been established and diabetes sessions operated to help people better manage their illness. Alternative therapies were available at St. Cecelia’s Church every Tuesday and a cafe would be opened there from September, 2004,on a trial basis, in advance of the development of the Healthy Living Centre. | |||
| The Panel thanked Jo Ritson and Clair Liversidge and noted the information reported. | |||
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7. | FOXHILL NEIGHBOURHOOD STRATEGY | |||
| The Panel agreed to defer consideration of this item to a future meeting. | |||
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8. | PUBLIC QUESTIONS AND PETITIONS | |||
| The Panel received a petition, which had been previously submitted to the meeting of the City Council on 7th July, 2004, containing 464 signatures, protesting about the decision to allow a mobile phone mast to be erected outside Chaucer School, near the bus stop and crossing on Halifax Road, and calling on the Council to address the problem. Mr. Ian O’Keith made representations on behalf of the petitioners, setting out their concerns about the erection of the mast and particularly the lack of communication between the City Council and local residents on this issue. Since the petition had been submitted to Council a meeting had been arranged for Tuesday, 27th July, 2004, at 7.00 p.m. at the Foxhill and District Club, Keats Road, and it was hoped that all the parties involved would be able to attend. | |||
| The Panel noted that (a) the petition had been submitted to the City Council on 7th July, 2004, and that Councillor Tim Rippon (Cabinet Member for Economic Regeneration and Planning Policy) had given an undertaking to look into the issues and reply to the petitioners and had referred the petition for consideration by the North and West Planning and Highways Area Board at the meeting to be held on Tuesday, 27th July, 2004; and | |||
| (b) the Chair would contact Councillor Tim Rippon for an update on this issue and contact the lead petitioner in due course. | |||
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9. | POLICE ACTIVITY IN THE AREA | |||
| In response to a question from the Chair an update on police activity in the area was provided by Sgt. Mark Simms. | |||
| He referred particularly to issues relating to properties due to be demolished and indicated that 40 people had been arrested for breaking and entering into properties. There was also such a problem in respect of arson, with 15 recent incidents, and a major priority was to catch the perpetrators. Sgt. Simms acknowledged that whilst some of these incidents could be drug related much of the activity was as a result of anti-social behaviour, which was being tackled in conjunction with the work undertaken by Lisa Casey, the City Councils Community Safety Officer for the area. | |||
| The Panel noted this information. | |||
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10. | MINUTES | |||
| The Panel received and approved the minutes of the meeting held on 11th March, 2004. | |||
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11. | DATE OF NEXT MEETING | |||
| The Panel noted that the next public meeting would take place on Thursday, 23rd September, 2004, at 6.00 p.m. at Chaucer School. | |||
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