Draft Minutes for Fossoway and District Community Council (FDCC) meeting

Tuesday 7th February 2023, Carnbo Village Hall

Attending: Community Councillors (CCllrs) Sarah Bruce-Jones, Trudy Duffy, Nicola Marchant and Graham Pye; Perth & Kinross (P&K) Councillors David Cuthbert, Neil Freshwater, William Robertson and Richard Watters; 35 members of the public (MoP).

Apologies: CCllr Faiza Hansraj-Jackson; Assoc. CClrs Carol Farquar and Angus Cheape.

Declarations of interest: None

Major Announcement: The Blairingone War Memorial has finally been moved to its new location at the back of the Church yard, after a tireless campaign since 2002 by ex-Cllr Mike Barnacle. All present expressed their congratulations!

Police report

• The police sent apologies for not being able to attend the meeting in person and sent a list of local incidents of note from the previous four weeks: A housebreaking at Gartwhinzean Farm, and a driver charged for failing to stop after an accident.
• Roads Policing Officers recently held a day of action around Loch Leven resulting in 21 vehicles being stopped.
• CCllr Cheape reported that an incident of sheep worrying was attended by the Police and swiftly handled.

Minutes of the previous meeting: The minutes of the previous meeting were reviewed and signed off.

Matters Arising

Road Safety in FDCC Area (Including A977 Mitigation and Carnbo)

• CCllrs Duffy, Bruce-Jones and Marchant together with all four local Cllrs attended a meeting on 13th January with PKC’s Officers to discuss the outstanding issues. The Officers stressed the extreme budgetary and staffing constraints they are working under. Currently the focus is working on the review of all the temporary TROs that were put in place during Covid and then they will start to process all the 40 to 30mph TROs. As part of this process the Carnbo change will be actioned. Allowing for the length of the various approvals required, it’s hoped that the Carnbo signage would be in place by June or July, but more probably by autumn. PKC Officer Daryl McKeown committed to keeping the CC updated on progress.
• The Carnbo Traffic survey has been ordered and the CC members reiterated the need to do this during Dollar term time.
• CCllr Duffy reminded the meeting of the need for volunteers to join the Speedwatch programme.
• Of the original budget for A977 mitigation of £600k, only £190k remains, which will not be enough to complete all the originally planned measures. The signalisation of the School Road junction in Crook of Devon is planned to take place in either the Summer or October school holidays. The work is estimated to cost £150k and hence will use up the majority of the remaining budget. The CC members proposed that the Drum A977 traffic signals would be the next priority with the realignment of the A977/B9097 junction being reconsidered later. 
• Cllr Robertson commended the CC Members and his colleagues for progressing these issues. He added that Road Safety is a massive issue for PKC and although there is budget, there is a shortage of resource with recruitment ban in place.

Cut-Out Cops

• The CC has identified a supplier approved by the Police and will act as a common route for purchase to minimise shipping costs. Community groups need to raise the funding (£85 each) and identify people responsible for putting the signs out and in at night – they need to be strengthened and locked to a solid object! The Police recommend changing the location at frequent intervals. Contact the CC via the usual email address to place orders – see the CC’s FB page for details.

Community Speedwatch

• Volunteers are needed! Teams of three people are required to operate the equipment.

Brunt Hill Wind Farm

• Details of this were included in the recent Kinross Newsletter – a consultation will be held in due course.

Galileo – Craighead Wind Farm

• Members of the project team attended this meeting to give an overview of the project, which is currently at the scoping phase, with the report due to be submitted this month. Note that although this site is adjacent to the Brunt Hill project discussed last month, the two projects are not connected. As this scheme is intended to generate over 50MW, in the same way as the Brunt Hill scheme, it falls outside the normal planning process, but will be governed by a “Section 36” application which is decided directly by the Scottish Government, intended to be submitted in 2024. Cllr Cuthbert explained that PKC’s Planning Committee are statutory consultees to these applications and will submit their opinion to the application, consequently Cllrs Cuthbert and Watters will not be able to make any public comments to avoid invalidating their membership of the Committee.
• Galileo is an Italian company formed in 2020 but the Edinburgh office is staffed by people with longer experience of projects in this area. The Project Manager explained that following a hiatus in onshore wind development, there was now UK and Scottish governmental pressure to dramatically expand wind generation to stabilise the availability of power and move towards net zero. All the “easy” sites had already been developed and it was now necessary to consider sites at higher altitudes and with larger turbines (in excess of 200metres high) in order to catch enough wind to make the site economic. Further, with only European suppliers of turbines currently operating, there is no availability of smaller turbines anyway. This site would have about 12 turbines of this size.
• The company proposes to make an annual community grant of £5,000 per MW of installed equipment, anticipated to be £360,00 per annum for each year of the windfarm’s lifetime, and to offer opportunities for community investment in the scheme and hence to share in the profits. The 10km radius area surrounding the site covers several Community Council areas so it would be necessary to identify how any grants were distributed. There will also be a Construction Fund to address impacts of the construction process. The presenters stressed the company’s desire to work with the Community.
• Questions were then taken from the floor: How will effect on Loch Leven be mitigated? Nature Scotland and SEPA will review. Are individual properties compensated? Not the norm in Scotland. Previously the Friends of the Ochils have successfully defeated wind farm developments as an area of great landscape value? Pressures from government and energy crisis may be considered more significant. Why is this project right next to another one? That’s the way it works – companies strike deals with landowners of potential sites – there’s no overall planning; Scottish Government will decide which ones go ahead. How will the hill be accessed during construction? From the east of Carnbo.
• If there are any further questions from the Community they can be submitted to the CC’s email address and answers will be provided in next month’s meeting.

Fossoway Area Transport

• Kinross-shire Transport Forum has not met recently so no update. Cllr Cuthbert highlighted the Glenfarg Community Bus, which they are keen to develop. Stagecoach are interested in supporting Community Buses as a way of feeding passengers to their hubs.

Matters arising with no update since last meeting:, Fossoway Primary School Playground Noise, Blairingone War Memorial, Community Development Trust.

Consultations

There are two consultations still open for the public to comment on:

• Your Police 2022-2023: https://consult.scotland.police.uk/strategy-insight-and-innovation/your-police-2022-2023/ Closes 31st March 2023. The CC will respond, but individuals should comment too. The consensus is that the Police are resource constrained but do what they can well.
• Draft Energy Strategy and Just Transition Plan: https://consult.gov.scot/energy-and-climate-change-directorate/energy-strategy-and-just-transition-plan/ The Scottish Government’s vision for Scotland's energy system to 2045 and a route map of ambitions and actions to transform the way Scotland generates, transports and uses energy. Closes 4th April 2023.

New Business:

Local Place Plans

• CCllrs Marchant and Duffy have attended meetings with PKC in relation to LDP3 and will partner with the Community Development Trust and PKC to develop Local Place Plans. PKC is keen to lead on engagement with Youth, Elderly and Travellers, with the CC supporting. The CC will lead on the development of Local Place Plans.

Community Council Business

Meetings attended

• Road Safety Officers as described above; CCllrs Duffy and Marchant attended a meeting on 25th January with PKC Officers about Engagement with Children.

P&K Councillors’ Reports

• Cllr Robertson reported a complaint about long-term parking outside the shop in Crook of Devon. PKC Officers had suggested that the CC had been against restricting this in the past, but no-one present could remember that. There seems to be some confusion about the route and location of stops of the 202 Bus Service.
• Cllr Watters reported that PKC are seeing a £20M deficit on the budget with no obvious way to clear it. The Scottish Government has given OKC permission to refinance and change accounting methods to help.
• Cllr Cuthbert noted the intention that the next Kinross-shire Local Committee would be hybrid, i.e. part physical presence and part online.

Planning matters for period 04/01/2023 – 07/02/2023

DPEA Appeal 21/02133/AML, PPA-340-2151 https://www.dpea.scotland.gov.uk/CaseDetails.aspx?ID=122826

CCllrs Duffy and Marchant participated in the Scottish Reporter site visit on the 16th Jan 2023, in order that the reporter could acquaint himself with the site and local area; The CC expects to hear the outcome of the appeal in mid-February 2023.

Planning applications

Note that the first three applications had comment dates before this meeting, so were discussed online beforehand.

• 22/01976/FLL Formation of access track (in retrospect) at Land 360 metres south-west of Craigton House, Rumbling Bridge. The CC Objected on grounds that conditions associated with the prior application (22/00541/FLL) had not been met. However the PKC Planners informed the CC that this was not a material objection.
• 22/02064/FLL Erection of two dwelling houses at Land 15 metres north-west of Ivy Cottage, Gartwhinzean, Road Powmill. The CC Objected as contrary to Policy 1B – Placemaking.
• 22/02090/FLL Change of use, alterations and extension to agricultural building to mixed classes 1, 2, 3, 4, 6 and 10, formation of parking area and associated works at Solsgirth Home Farm, Solsgirth, Dollar, FK14 7NZ. The CC made a supportive comment.
• 22/02232/FLL Erection of two dwelling houses and associated works at Land 50 metres south-west of Barnhill Farm, Powmill. No CC Comment

Planning Decisions

• None this month.

AOCB: A MoP raised the issue that drainage on the A977 was a problem with large puddles appearing,

Draft Agenda for Next CC Meeting: Declarations of Interest, Community Policing, Minutes of last meeting. Matters arising: Access to Cash in Kinross, Community Development Trust, Fossoway Area Transport, A977 Mitigation, Crook Moss, Carnbo Speeding, Speedwatch, Community Council Business, PKC Councillors’ Reports, Planning, Correspondence, AOCB

The CC’s Facebook can be found at https://www.facebook.com/fossoway Note that it is only necessary to have a Facebook account to post comments, all can read content.

Next Meeting: Tuesday 7th March 2023

Powmill Moubray Hall

All are welcome!

Correspondence January 2023