8 Sept 2021, 8pm
Chairman's house
Agenda
1. Forthcoming Forum AGM
2. Attendance and Membership
3. Beach Box development
4. Any Other Business
1. Forthcoming Forum AGM
The AGM will be held in the QE II room at the Shoreham Centre, on September 22. Doors open at 6pm. A location on Shoreham Beach was not possible due the the lack of funds held by the Forum. The council offered the use of the venue free of charge. The availability of the venue determined the date of the meeting.
A quorum of ten forum members is required by the Forum Constitution. Email invitations have been sent to all SBNF members with email addresses (329 members & key stakeholders). 60% opened the email, and 8% took action. To ensure the maximum possible attendance the committee agreed to re-engage with as many members as possible.
2. Attendance and Membership
SBRA had asked the Management Committee whether new members could join the Forum at the AGM and vote during the meeting. Also whether candidates for election to the Management Committee could be proposed or seconded by such new members. According to the Neighbourhood Planning Laws, new resident members cannot be approved until their addresses have been verified. However, in the interests of encouraging new membership and their participation the committee agreed that people completing a membership application form, which will be available at the AGM, will be eligible to fully participate as members.
However, attendees are urged to RSVP before the meeting to speed up registration and help us to plan the layout for social distancing.
Note: the committee later agreed to allow proxy voting. The form is available below:
3. Beach Box development
JM reported that he was queried by a Forum member regarding the licensing application for the Beach Box development. The local resident enquired what role the Forum had played in its planning and licensing application. This was discussed by the Committee:
The starting point in the Boxpark story was the Council’s long-established need for redevelopment of the toilet block site.
In dealing with development proposals the Council used our draft planning brief, surveys and resident comments compiled by SBNF.
The developers simply accessed this information on our website along with the draft Beach Green Master Plan for the holistic development of the site.
In 2017, a resident briefly volunteered to be SBNF secretary and disclosed one of her clients was Boxpark. She enquired if SBNF would support their planning application.
We declined to do so and she resigned.
Nor did we approve anything to do with the operation of the site.
Planning permission has since been given, which was granted without our support.
Without a drinks license there would be no plan for re-development of the site.
The licensing application is concerned with permitted hours. The developer (Roger Wade) has made significant concessions in his application, e.g. no off-sales.
However, SBNF are not represented on the licencing committee - the committee witnessed a letter confirming that Cllr David Collins is not permitted to address the licensing application meeting.
SBNF are constrained by the Local Plan and Planning laws and no residents have made use of the comments box (see attached) nor made any other formal contact with us via the website or our dedicated Facebook section regarding this issue since BeachBox was proposed.
We have therefore made no formal letter of support or objection to the BoxPark application. The developers simply made use of our publicly available planning brief and integrated draft masterplan (attached) for the holistic development of the site.
Redevelopment of the toilet block is part of the council’s Local Plan (“creating a network of community places and spaces, “employment, etc.”) and therefore needs to be part of the Neighbourhood Plan.
4. Any Other Business
The date and time for the October Management Committee meeting will be decided after the AGM.
Meeting closed at 2130.
Attendees:
Dave Collins (DC) Chairman
Kevin Hall (KH) Vice Chairman
Mike Gibson (MG) Planning Consultant
Jonathan Marshall (JM) Treasurer
Mike Whelan (MW) Secretary