Catch up on what happened at the Annual Parish Meeting

We heard brilliant reports from local organisations – Burlescombe & Westleigh Community Hall, Westleigh URC, Burlescombe Primary School PTFA, Westleigh Youth Club, The Burlescombe & Westleigh History Group, the Pop-Inns, the running group, Four Villages Environmental Group and St Mary’s Church.

The reports really brought home the work people are putting into our community, and also highlighted some very real challenges some of these groups are facing. Please read the reports (in the Annual Parish Meeting minutes below) to get an idea of what is going on in your community.

The Council also gave an overview of the last year, a year in which we’ve navigated a lot of challenges and worked hard to get the Council back on sound footing and functioning efficiently. The Report in the minutes will give you an idea of what we’ve done in the past year.

We followed the Annual Parish Meeting with the Annual Meeting of the Parish Council, key updates are:

• Cllr Emma Forward was re-elected as Chair.
• Cllr Helen Walker stepped down as Vice-Chair and Cllr Lucy Elliss-Brookes was elected into the role.
• Cllr Fran Box will continue to represent us at the Grand Western Canal Joint Advisory Committee and lead on Broadband.
• Cllr Judy Downing will continue to attend Westleigh Quarry Liaison Group.
• Cllr Stuart McDonald will continue as Police liaison, Highways/Road and Snow Warden, and Emergency Planning.
• Cllr Helen Walker will be School Liaison.
• Cllr Emma Forward will act as liaison with St Mary’s Church and Westleigh URC.
• Cllr Tsara Smith will continue to lead on Public Rights of Way and Communications.
• The Council now has a Unity Trust Bank account and will transfer over to it soon.
• We will be contacting Devon Health and Wellbeing Board about an assessment of the need for, and most effective location of, any additional defibrillators in the parish – ahead of seeking funding.
• The Council selected a quote to replace the fencing around Westleigh play park.
• The Council will be receiving notification about Westleigh Quarry Nightworks and will assess over the coming months whether this is a suitable solution for notifying affected residents.
• We are writing for a second time to Wellington Weekly News to correct the significant inaccuracies in their recent news article about the Council.

See the minutes below for more detail.