Say "NO!" to any development on this unique and historic site
In a letter dated 15.1 19 the Environment Agency say that they are satisfied that the secondary scheme now presented by the council (ie into the canal) represents a “just about viable” alternative to a direct discharge into the sea.
You can read the letter here EA letter 15.1.19
And details of the secondary scheme here Herringtons Report – Dec 2018
On 29 October we put in this FoI request to the council:
“Please provide me with all correspondence since 1 Jan 2018 , including any brief/instructions, to or from Arlingclose Ltd in relation to the Princes Parade project.”
The council deemed it an EIR not an FoI (as they are unfortunately entitled to do) and charged us £12.50 which we paid.
They should have provided the information by 26 November but despite chasing them we have still not received the information.
We have reported them to the ICO.
(Arlingclose are the council’s treasury management consultants)..
Following some posts on social media yesterday claiming that FHDC officers know that the PP project could be viable without the housing we checked with the Dr Priest , Head of Paid Services at FHDC, to see if this was true.
Her reply was: “Many thanks for your email. I don’t recognise the contents of your email at all, and can offer no other explanation than this being unwelcome and unnecessary mischief making, perpetuating completely false information.I have nothing further to add.”
Just received this notification from the District Council:
Please note that the Princes Parade item will not be ready for consideration at the December meeting of the Cabinet and has therefore been deferred. We have not yet confirmed a date for the item to be heard, but I will keep you informed.
We have sent in our objections (on behalf of all members of SPP) to the cabinet meeting on Dec 12th being held in private. We have based this the fact that the public interest in the information being published outweighs the council’s need to keep the information confidential for commercial reasons. We have also argued that the law does not allow the council to keep information private if it relates to planning permission that they may grant themselves. (Note that although they have approved permission subject to the EA withdrawing their objection they have not formally granted that permission.)
Please keep the date of the meeting in your diary so that if we are allowed in we have a good turnout. 5pm
The Princes Parade business case will be discussed in the cabinet meeting on 12th December 5pm. Please put the date in your diaries.
However, notice has been issued that at least part of the meeting will be held in private because of “Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information). ‘Financial or business affairs’ includes contemplated as well as current activities.”
Representations may be made by any person, to the Cabinet, stating why the meeting (or parts thereof) should be held in public. Please submit these in writing to committee@folkestone-hythe.gov.uk or Committee Services, Folkestone and Hythe District Council, Civic Centre, Castle Hill Avenue, Folkestone, Kent, CT20 2QY, by noon on the sixth working day prior to the meeting date.
http://www.folkestone-hythe.gov.uk/moderngov/mgListPlanItems.aspx?PlanId=252&RP=142
In August the planning committee approved the planning application for Princes Parade subject to the Environment Agency withdrawing their objection to the surface water being drained into the Royal Military Canal.
The EA have confirmed in this letter dated 15.10.18 that they will not be withdrawing their objection. EA – objection upheld letter
Princes Parade Working Group – March 2018 version A (1)
Slide 6 claims there will be 351276 users per annum ie 960 per day which seems somewhat optimistic. It also claims a “revenue turnaround” of £332779. What does that mean? profit? turnover? The plan seems to be to outsource the management of the facility to a 3rd party with the 3rd party paying the council £61009 per annum. Slide 7 says that 5 trusts have shown interest in running the new leisure centre but have they been shown realistic figures?
Slide 11 lists some developers who have been approached re the housing land. Slide 12 claims a high level of interest from these developers but states that they would prefer to acquire the land for the whole 150 new homes. (The council’s Financial Viability calculations assumed that it would be sold off as two separate plots.) The slide also says that the developers would prefer a joint venture/structured land sale rather than a straight land sale.
We have sent the solicitors the information they requested and they are now reviewing it all.
The committee vote is a “resolution to approve” and the 6-week time frame to bring JR proceedings does not start until the Council issues the formal decision notice of the grant of planning permission. We are monitoring the council’s website so that we spot when that happens.
However, the council have given an undertaking to the Secretary of State that it will not issue planning permission until he has had the opportunity to consider whether to intervene.
If the Secretary of State does decide to call in the application we may need legal representation at the public inquiry.
We also need to keep an eye on the progress of the local plan which is due to be examined in public this autumn. As you all know the draft plan does include a development policy for Princes Parade and we need to continue to work towards getting this policy deleted before the plan is adopted.
We won’t call in the pledges or set up the crowd funding page until we have a clearer idea how much money we will need to raise.In the meantime our new fundraising committee is busy coming up with ideas for events which we are sure you will all support.
Re the meeting the council had with the Environment Agency on 22nd August regarding the drainage of the surface water into the Canal , the planning officer told us “Discussions are ongoing and the applicant is preparing a document for submission in order to address their concerns”.
Watch this space – we can still Save Princes Parade!
Over the past couple of weeks we’ve been studying the financial viability reports. There are lots of inconsistencies in these reports so this has not been an easy task.
Clearly the consultants have inflated the costs of the leisure centre on Nickoll’s Quarry to make it look less viable than PP.
They claim that the leisure centre on PP will need a contribution from the council of £2m after taking into account the income from the housing but that figure has been calculated by cobbling together figures from two different reports which were prepared using different bases and assumptions.
Because of this they have failed to take into account all the exceptional costs that apply to phases 3 & 4 (ie the housing phases) so it’s likely that the cost to the council will be considerably more than £2m.
They have also tried to inflate the income for PP eg by including the £1.4m off site affordable housing contribution from the Imperial Green development.
At this stage so much about the project is still uncertain so nobody can be sure of the exact costs. Therefore from a planning point of view we don’t think much weight should be placed on the viability studies.
From a financial point of view we think the council has a lot more work to do so that they have a better understanding of the risks involved and the cash flow implications of this project.
We have sent a more detailed comment on the FV calculation to the planning dept.