Article published in The Elmswell Newsletter - September 2015

The urgency of the Steering Group’s task meant that they felt they should meet in August. 10 members were joined at Blackbourne by Nick Ward, the Corporate Manager for Community Planning at Mid Suffolk / Babergh and his colleague Duncan Merren. Gillian Benjamin, of Community Action Suffolk, attended as part of the continuing support which they are giving to the Elmswell project.

Updated statistical forecasts for Elmswell school were tabled showing that, just taking into account the new housing on the Bacon Factory site, the school is going to be full to capacity in 2018. The Neighbourhood Plan seeks to direct the development of the village for the next 25 years, so the pressing need for a policy on primary school provision is obvious.

Various members had worked on the very first drafts of 3 sections of the plan under the direction of Steve Chetwyn of Urban Vision Enterprise, a Community Interest Company which specialises in community planning and which is retained as professional advisers for the main Elmswell plan process. These drafts were tabled and discussed towards further development and the Mid Suffolk officers undertook to monitor the emerging plan and advise accordingly.

It was agreed that Andrew McMillan, a Mid Suffolk Planning officer with special expertise in the area of site specific allocations and who has been monitoring the District’s recent, ‘Call for sites’ initiative, should be invited to attend the next group meeting scheduled for early September.

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Thu 08 Oct 2015