MINUTES OF THE SSNA ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
Thursday 17th September 2020 at 7.30pm held on Zoom
1. Apologies for absence: Mark Randall, Jack Hamilton, Penny Pemberton, Margaret Golding, Amin Mawji, Lisa Webster, Anthea Winterton and Margaret Hamilton.
Present: Colin Iddles (Chair), Hannah Witkowska (Dep Chair}, Ann Morton, Anne Wakeham, Sandra Berkovi, Brian Adams, Sheila Collis, Joan Hunt
2. Minutes of 2019 AGM: were agreed
3. 2019 Accounts: The accounts were summarised by Colin Iddles. Hannah Witkowska will take over as Treasurer during 2021.The changes made over the last few years have reduced expenditure significantly especially because of in-house printing of the newsletters. The costs may be further reduced with more members taking an electronic newsletter. There was a financial surplus this year and income is now fairly steady. Thought will have to be given to how the association deals with the move away from the use of cash in society. The website will be able to handle PayPal for those who would prefer to pay their subscriptions in this way.
July’s delivery of the newsletter was achieved thanks to all the individual road representatives who delivered the paper copies where this was necessary. The Committee asked that their thanks to the road representatives should be expressed in the next newsletter.
4. 2019 Annual Report: A written Annual Report is included with these Minutes. A summary was provided by Colin:
Recently announced changes to the planning system means that the Sutton Plan in process at the moment may be redundant as it is superseded by a National Plan with accommodation units targets set by central government.
National Policy Planning (NPPF)
-
In overall terms there are three categories of change:Changes to be included in the White Paper
-
Permitted development changes - this change is effective from 1st September 2020
-
Used Class order changes
Community Infrastructure Levy monies (levied by LBS on developers and used to fund infrastructure) and Sect 106 (negotiated by LBS with developers and can fund such things as affordable housing) are to be scrapped and replaced with a new levy.
CIL monies in London currently are distributed by the Local Authority and spent in LB Sutton through the six Local Committees.
-
The White Paper proposes three categories of development or zones which each council has to identify in their Local Plan. These are:Growth areas
-
Renewal areas
-
Protect areas
Housing targets are also to be set nationally and these are likely to increase over time.
In the future, it is possible that there will be a National Plan and then Local Plans without any intermediate plans such as the London Plan.
The timeframe to produce the revised Local Plans is three years from the date the legislation is passed.
The Association’s involvement in the local Neighbourhood Development Plan continues and the NDP referendum will probably be mid 2021 though not on the same day as the deferred 2020 local elections.
Area of Special Local Character (ASLC) status was achieved this year for the Sutton Farm area.
Most recently the SSNA members have shown concerns about trialling of road closures as well as ongoing car parking changes.
The website set up and maintained by Steve Morton enables subscriptions to be paid by PayPal, especially important now when cash is far less frequently used. Equally important the website is more likely to have current information when the paper version of the newsletter may be out of date.
5. Election of Committee members: All the current members of the committee were willing to stand for re-election and were duly re-elected. Mark Randall, as deputy chair, has particular responsibility for that part of the SSNA area to the south of The Downsway and Crossways.
6. AOB:
Joan Hunt asked about methods of recruiting new members when houses in the area were sold. To some extent the methods depend on the road representatives’ ideas but usually consist of visiting newcomers with a free copy of the newsletter and an explanation of the association.
Joan Hunt brought up concerns, echoed by Sandra Berkovi and Hannah Witkowska, about the impact recent changes to the speed limit have had on Crossways/Downsway traffic as the road becomes a “rat run” for vehicles trying to avoid all the new 20mph roads. This density of traffic is causing a reduction in air quality but is also very noisy with impatient drivers using their horns. There is also some evidence that there is a major increase in lorries and coaches using this road. Hannah pointed out that unlike Chiltern Road, Crossways has only had one renewal of tarmac to her knowledge so this amount of extra traffic will damage the road.
Anne Wakeham
20.9.2020