In a recent LPL Briefing we were interested to read about a community affected by quarrying proposals and their plans activities to protect adjacent communities from the environmental impact of these developments.

Ladybank is within the centre of an extensive quarrying area in North East Fife with over 800,000 tonnes of minerals excavated and transported and nearly 100,000 tonnes of waste imported to a landfill site, all within 2km of the village.

Our Trust was set up to bring benefit to the community which has been blighted by this ongoing industrial activity. However we now find that we are being confronted by a new planning application for the extraction of a further 1M tonnes of minerals and a very recent application by the landfill operators, Fife Council, to discharge effluent into local water courses.
 
The mineral application entails clear felling over 50 acres of Forestry Commission plantation which is a red squirrel habitat, extracting the gravel over five to six years, then re-planting trees at a far lower ground level than now.  Adjacent to this proposed site, Fife Council plan to
construct a leachate plant to extract run off water from the landfill and pipe this to an adjacent burn for discharge.

The community are perturbed by the large volumes of visible surface water arising from these gravel workings and the potential environmental  dangers which may be created were these new planning applications to be approved.

The local community have requested the Trust explore all possible means of ensuring that the community’s best interests are protected and that the community’s voice is heard. If any other communities have experience of being faced with these circumstances I would be very grateful to hear from them.

Ladybank Development Trust

MSC in Community Development Jargon

Course content:

Community Development Praxis

This enables you to understand and critically examine a range of contested political ideas and theories and to explore the modernist, post-modernist and post-structuralist paradigms and relate them to contemporary community development practice.

Critical Issues in Community Development

This enables you to utilise Freirean theoretical tools to understand the issues of hegemony and counter hegemony inherent in contemporary community development practice.

Urban Social Theory

This explores the interaction of public and private space and the experience of urban life as the conflict between strategies of incorporation and domination and tactics for personal liberation. It will also look at the ideas of transgression in terms of geography and identity. Community Development Fieldwork

This enables you to understand the cultural, historical and hegemonic processes which operate within urban spaces and which shape and constrain people’s subjectivities and social interactions.
 

Author: Stephen Maxwell, TfN

From sub prime crisis to credit crunch to global financial meltdown to economic recession to the beginning of global recovery. All in two years.

The speed at which a financial crisis advertised as the most severe since the 1930s has apparently moved through its cycle is breathtaking. Champions of the existing system – and these include virtually all developed country governments concede that the after effects of the crisis, particularly high unemployment and its long tail of social consequences, will persist. But they claim that their emergency actions have averted the danger of a long haul depression on the scale of the 1930s, and look forward to a resumption of business more or less as usual.

For the defenders of the system an additional advantage of the speed at which the cycle has turned is that the critics have not had time to develop a persuasive alternative let alone promote it to the wider public. Apart from calls for curbs on bankers’ bonuses, proposals for the separation of retail and wholesale banking, customer representation on bank boards, and the creation of a publicly owned banking sector through the outright nationalisation of RBS and Lloyds, have failed to gain a hearing beyond the pages of the Guardian or the Opinion supplement of The Sunday Herald. More radical proposals, such as for the development of a community banking alternative to the commercial sector, have failed to reach much beyond the columns of the minority radical magazines.

Civil society is fully implicated in this failure. For the past decade or more third sector zealots have been talking up civil society in general and the voluntary sector in particular as the vehicle of a new wave of social mobilisation inspired by a shining vision of an empowered democracy of active citizens. But the global crisis has found civil society so far lacking a distinctive organised voice. As the sceptics predicted it has continued to speak with the many voices of its organisational diversity, perhaps the only common feature a tone of increased desperation at the social costs of the existing system.

But Scottish civil society has an opportunity to contribute to the so far exiguous Scottish debate. (The reasons for the poverty of Scottish debate lie too deep in Scotland’s institutional deficits to be excavated here). The parliament’s economy committee is carrying out an inquiry into the impact of the global financial crisis on Scotland and how the country should respond. Its invitation for submissions is no doubt aimed primarily at Scotland’s financial and business community, but despite some tendentious questions – for example “how can we ensure that Scotland’s financial sector retains a global perspective and does not retreat into a purely localised lending regime?” The committee’s agenda provides plenty of scope for alternative perspectives from the third sector.

The range of groups with a locus to respond is wide – anti-poverty groups, urban and rural regeneration groups, financial mutuals including credit unions, housing organisations and campaigning groups, social enterprises, charity banks, groups supporting unemployed and other economically vulnerable people. Indeed any organisation whose members are feeling the impact of the economic recession triggered by the failures of key UK and Scottish financial institutions and of the UK regulatory system charged with securing their stability could respond.

Ideally, interested organisations should collaborate in developing their responses but a 11 September deadline precludes that.

So here’s an entirely personal template for voluntary sector submissions: the role of the existing

financial sector in creating and sustaining gross inequalities; the human and economic costs of such inequalities; the need to create a Scottish financial system which serves the urgent social and environmental as well as economic needs of Scotland; the underdevelopment throughout the UK of the mutual and community based financial sector compared to other developed economies including the US and Canada; the need for a UK and Scottish strategy to redress that underdevelopment; the role of a not for profit financial institutions; the failure of the UK regulatory system to protect the established Scottish mutual sector and the stability of other key institutions; a Scottish say in the regulation of a reformed Scottish financial sector.

Author: Third Sector

Kilfinan Community Forest Company – a tale of frustration

Background

The Kilfinan project began in 2005 following extensive community consultations, which revealed that a lack of affordable housing, jobs, and economically active residents were key issues threatening the future of the community.  It was also identified that if the community were able to acquire an area of forest adjoining the village that this could be a solution to these issues.  

In 2007, a group of residents representing most corners of the parish were voted in by the Kilfinan community to establish the Kilfinan Community Forest Company (KCFC) as a registered Scottish Charity. In 2008 a feasibility study looked at what benefits and opportunities the forest could actually bring to the community and the results were encouraging  Two local people were employed to raise awareness of this dynamic project and the plans to revitalise the Kilfinan Parish community.  There are now over 150 members of the company

The group (KCFC)  has continued to be very active over the last 4 years and successfully applied to National Forest land Scheme to buy the area of forest that had been identified  behind our village.  The biggest problem they faced has been the lack of central or public support/funding for community based asset acquisitions and management.  The closure of the Scottish Land Fund has meant that the only route for the community was to apply to the BIG Lottery’s Growing Community Assets fund.    

For nearly 6 months the community worked up its application with their case officer from the Lottery.  The Lottery were somewhat wary about community-managed housing initiatives such as woodland crofts or any leaseholds being established but they were supportive and encouraging.  The Lottery also wanted them to demonstrate that they had sought a reduction in the market value of the forest – which they did.    It was not enough.  After months of hard work and being encouraged to believe that their application was going to be successful, the Lottery rejected their application on the grounds it didn’t ‘fit’ their criteria and desired outcomes and that the project was not good value of public money.     They have since tried other public funders with similar results and with the NFLS application window closing in January 2010 the community have had to find another way forward. 

They are now pursuing a phased acquisition where they purchase a smaller area (125ha) with private funding raised by the community themselves by January 2010.  They then have 5 years to find the rest of the funding or a solution for the remaining area.   They have actively lobbied their national and local politicians on these issues and feel that either appropriate funding support should be made available or that the areas of the National Forest Estate should be transferred or gifted to properly constituted community groups to manage for themselves and the wider community benefit.
 
This forest, under community management, will unlock the potential to deliver:
 
• Local firewood delivery and woodchip supplies
• Sawn timber supplies
• Timber products such as kennels, garden furniture
• Waymarked footpaths with picnic areas and stunning viewpoints
• Mountain bike trails and an adventure playground
• Access to beautiful mid-Atlantic oakwoods, lochans and open hill home to red squirrel, golden eagle, black grouse and red deer
• Ecoburials in a sacred grove
• Pet ecoburials
• Skills development, training and employment opportunities
• Local produce from allotments and crofts
• Forest education and forest school
• Forest crofts and small business enterprises
• Rejuvenate the native oakwood, creating habitats for wildlife and people

In the community’s view and in the view of everyone they have spoken to, this project is a win – win for all parties and they cannot understand why they are being thwarted at every turn in their pursuit of funding.

Author: Third Sector

Government scheme attracts 900 queries ahead of September opening date

More than 900 voluntary organisations have submitted expressions of interest in applying for funding from Communitybuilders, the £70m government scheme that opens for applications on 7 September.

Communitybuilders is a £70m investment fund which takes forward a commitment within the Govt’s white paper – Communities in Control : Real People , Real Power to build more cohesive, empowered and active communities.

Communitybuilders will invest in the sustainability of multi-purpose, inclusive, community-led organisations (sometimes known as Community Anchors). These organisations can be the platform to support empowered communities by:
• providing a place for community activities to take place
• providing and running local services
• stimulating community involvement and enterprise
• generating independent sources of income

Successful applicants should be able to demonstrate that their ideas “make a real and lasting difference to their local communities”.

Sixty per cent of awards from the fund will be loans, and the remainder will be grants.

Not-for-profit groups can apply for loans of between £50,000 and £2m over 10 years. They will pay 5 per cent interest for the first three years before rates are reviewed. Organisations can also apply for grants of between £2,000 and £75,000.

“We hope to start making decisions on some of the smaller funding applications by the end of September, but larger investments requiring greater due diligence will probably take until early October,” said Caroline Forster, deputy chief executive of the Adventure Capital Fund, which is managing Communitybuilders.

http://www.communitybuildersfund.org.uk/

Author: Graham Boyd

Right to buy decisions should be local
 
I enjoyed reading the outcomes of LPL’s land reform meeting held in June which considered how civil society should seek to drive the land reform process. I found it a useful and interesting agenda of land reform topics.
 
My key observation lies with actions on the Community Right to Buy.  I consider that one of the fundamental weaknesses in the CRB legislation is that it was not devolved to local government. Community land is primarily a local issue and as such central government is very remote from the issues that motivate local communities. Furthermore community land is directly linked to local planning at all levels – environment, social, economic and intergerational, etc. We have since the late 1940s had a devolved planning system in Scotland. Community land is directly related to this system and local government has both the political and administrative systems and capacity to make the necessary judgements and decisions on all the issues that CRB raises. Therefore the whole CRB process should be devolved to local government who should have the power to adust the rules and regulations as they see fit within their strategic and local planning processes subject to Ministerial approval.

We need remove the current roles and responsibilities from the Scottish Government’s Land Reform ‘police’  (Community Assets Branch and its legal advisers) and turn all CRB decision-making over to local authority planning committees and departments.  There is absolutely no point in encouraging more communities to participate in a process which has proven itself over the past five years to be fundamentally flawed and lacking in transparency and accountability. Within the current arrangements (per the Community Assets Branch) we have a set of completely unsupervised administrators who : (i) encourage communities to apply to register land; (ii) provide low level technical advice; (iii) vet all applications and recommend either approval/rejection; and (iv) draft the Ministerial letters.  The Homehill court appeal in 2006 exposed the ‘kafkesque system’ that is still in place. The role of the Minister and the Community Assets Branch should be to monitor the implementation of the CRB and resolve appeals. Nothing more.

Author: Bella Bathurst, The Observer

Mike Scott is a very angry man. He is standing on the drive at Overburns Farm in Lamington, overlooking the Clyde, glaring around at the rose garden, the Georgian farmhouse, the newly planted orchard, the restored farm buildings.

Behind is the fabulous backdrop of the river and the great landmark curves of Tinto Hill. None of this timeless tableau of birds, sheep, hills and water is soothing his soul. In fact, that very view is currently his biggest problem.

Scott is a farmer and landowner in South Lanarkshire, with 900 ewes and a stretch of land sandwiched between the A702 and the Clyde. Aside from the scenery, the land has one very powerful attraction: it is rich in minerals.

Back in 2007 he approached Patersons, a large quarry and waste management company, with a view to exploiting the site. Patersons has now applied to the local council for permission to extract nearly five million tonnes of sand and gravel over the next 11 to 15 years.

The plan has gone down badly, to say the least. Patersons, opponents claim, has a habit of turning small operations into large ones, spent excavations into landfill sites, and old quarries into licensed dumps. As a result, the row has turned very public, very quickly, and Overburns has become the focus of one of the bitterest environmental rows in Scotland in recent years.

The land follows a spectacularly beautiful route along the Clyde towards the Pentland Hills. The river is alive with birds and brown trout, clear of silt and easily accessible. I know it well; this is where I’m from. Until recently, the main sources of controversy were decorous standoffs between anglers, twitchers and canoeists over who had the right to the bank.

Now this tranquillity faces a threat that has led objectors to form a campaign group called Crag – Clyde River Action Group – to take on Patersons and the Scotts. Patersons says it plans no more than a relatively small-scale operation extracting sand and gravel above and below the water level, taking it out via the A702 and restoring the site in phases afterwards. Crag supporters don’t believe what they are being told; once the quarry is there, they say, it would be a relatively small step to have the whole valley redesignated as an industrial zone.

Mary McLatchie now lives opposite Overburns, but grew up next to Mount Vernon in Glasgow’s east end, a former Patersons quarry that was turned into one of the largest landfill sites in Europe. She does not believe Patersons’ assurances. “I would bet my life that they’ll turn that into waste management. You hit clay very quickly down there, and clay is very good for landfill sites.”

McLatchie says she has known since childhood what it is like to live beside a Patersons quarry. Mount Vernon, Coatbridge and Baillieston (all in Lanarkshire) were affected by what Patersons did, she added. “Mount Vernon went from being a small quarry to a huge landfill site; we lived with dirt and muck constantly… They’ve got massive pipes coming out of the ground because they’re trying to get rid of the smell – they had a licence to dump 27 different waste materials down there.”

These views are rejected by the plan’s supporters. “There’s absolutely no landfilling going to take place at all,” says Mike Scott. “No question whatsoever. Categorically no.” Kemp Lindsay, estates director for Patersons, says the same. “I can categorically assure you there will be absolutely no landfilling on this site. Ever. Full stop. Any allegation there will be is nonsense and scaremongering.”

But those closer to Overburns are concerned for more immediate reasons. Ian Parker runs a 160-hectare (400-acre) farm on the other side of the river. It is the second largest organic dairy farm in central Scotland, and Parker is worried. Organic land has to go through a two-year conversion process, so if one part of his farm is polluted with silt, he can’t just rent land elsewhere.

“The quarry will destroy the upper Clyde valley in less than two years,” he says. “So what happens in 15 years makes no difference.” The anglers agree. The Clyde floods regularly on to the proposed quarry site. If silt gets into the river, the fish disappear. As do the tourists. Local angler Mark McGee says: “The thought of coming to South Lanarkshire with your family to find your B&B has a superquarry next door is not that appealing.”

As Ian Parker points out, there are seven quarries within a 15-mile radius of Overburns, three producing sand and gravel. “There’s a new quarry five miles up the road and it’s not working at capacity: why do they need this?” The area certainly has a lot of very big holes. Over the centuries, its mineral resources and its proximity to the coast have ensured that Lanarkshire has been taken for everything it has: coal, iron ore, lead, zinc, copper, sand, gravel, rock, peat – even gold. There is little question that quarrying can be an ugly business. A little farther up the M74 at Strathaven, Patersons’ Dunduff quarry is working at full stretch extracting sandstone, grit and hardcore. Walk over the high moors and abruptly the ground drops away, revealing layers of earth, past red Lanarkshire grit through grey shale, right to the black stuff. Ground water clogs the deepest parts, thick with silt and lime deposits. Far below, diggers scratch at the high faces while dump trucks file in and out. It looks like Tolkie’s Mordor.

The comparison, insist Scott and Patersons, is unfair. Scott claims the quarry will enhance the area when it’s finished. “By the time the third phase is done, the first phase will have been restored into a recreational area, a nature reserve. We’re going to landscape it with pretty shrubs all round the site … There’s absolutely no fear of the river being affected at all.” But people – and birds and fish – seem to like it the way it is. “Quite honestly, when this is done, it will be a damn sight nicer than it is now. The actual site is a very plain, dull field… This is creating a certain amount of ill feeling, I know, and I’m just ignoring it, because I know that when this is done it’s going to be absolutely smashing.”

Only time will tell. The planning application is in, and both sides have three weeks to present their arguments to South Lanarkshire council. Whatever the outcome, the affair has opened a much deeper seam; how long can anyone go on taking from a landscape before the landscape itself starts to fight back?

Glasgow and West of Scotland Forum of Housing Associations

Response to the Draft Housing (Scotland) Bill

August 2009

Enhancing the Role of Community Based Housing Associations in Regeneration and Neighbourhood Management

Draft 31 July 09

Summary

1.1               In the Housing Bill Consultation Paper, the Scottish Government has stated its wish to lead a national debate about “the role and purpose of social housing, what it should be delivering for current and future tenants, and how it can contribute to wider policy objectives”.  The proposals we have set out in this paper are intended as an initial contribution to the debate.

1.2               Through the Housing Bill, GWSF would like to see much more explicit recognition of the role that social housing providers such as community-based housing associations (CBHAs) can play in developing safe, popular and sustainable neighbourhoods.

1.3               We also want to discuss, with national and local decision-makers, how local communities can play a bigger part within their neighbourhoods, acting through locally owned and resident controlled bodies such as CBHAs and development trusts. 

1.4               So this paper sets out ideas about how local communities can become more actively involved in the management of their neighbourhoods, by working in partnership with local authorities and others, or through an enhanced role in helping to manage the way services are delivered to local people.

2.           CBHAs and Regeneration

2.1               CBHAs have played a leading part in promoting community ownership of housing in Scotland for more than 30 years. 

2.2               We have shown that community ownership of assets can help achieve a wide range of benefits:

2.3               In the last decade, many Scottish housing associations have diversified beyond their core landlord role, to address the wider issues in their local communities.  This has been a particular priority for CBHAs. 

2.4               In comparison with other types of housing providers, CBHAs typically work in some of Scotland’s most disadvantaged communities.  As housing providers, we see at first hand and on a daily basis the effects of poverty, poor health, worklessness and other types of inequality on individuals and whole communities.  Because we are community-led and community-controlled organisations, we have a direct interest in wanting to address these issues.

3.           Community Regeneration and the Housing Bill

3.1               The contribution that CBHAs already make to community regeneration has been acknowledged in the recent Community Empowerment Action Plan, published jointly by the Scottish Government and COSLA. ^[1]   But community regeneration issues do not register as a priority for the present Scottish Housing Regulator, and the Housing Bill Consultation Paper does not identify this as an area for change.

3.2               The Community Empowerment Action Plan is clear that empowered and engaged communities will be a key factor in areas such as health and poverty, and in supporting people to become part of the social and economic mainstream.

3.3               Fresh thinking is needed on this part of the Housing Bill, because:

3.4               We would like future work on the Housing Bill to address this in two ways:

·        The outcomes set in the proposed Scottish Social Housing Charter should deal explicitly with issues relating to neighbourhood management, community empowerment and community regeneration;

·        The new Scottish Housing Regulator should address these outcomes, and place a positive value on them in its assessment methods.

3.5               In this regard, the statutory duties of the social housing regulator in England include a requirement for it to address the following fundamental objective:

3.6               We would like to see the new Scottish Housing Regulator having a similar statutory objective.  This would recognise that addressing these issues is not just incidental part of some housing organisations’ purpose, it is an integral part of what they do.

3.7               Policy-makers and regulators have recently been highly critical about the value provided by the social housing sector.[3]   So it is no surprise that the Housing Bill and Consultation Paper emphasise the importance of outcomes for tenants and of delivering value for tenants and the taxpayer. 

3.8               We do not disagree with these principles, but it is essential that the national debate should address outcomes and the measurement of value in much more meaningful ways.

3.9               Neither present methods for assessing value, nor those proposed in the Consultation Paper, address a wide range of outcomes that CBHAs are either directly responsible for, or to which we contribute through our work with local authorities and others.  For example:

3.10           Measuring impact and value in relation to these types of outcomes is undoubtedly challenging, but that is not a reason for ignoring them.

3.11           It is likely that some of these “bigger picture” outcomes would be better addressed through thematic studies or periodic evaluations rather than routine regulatory processes.   

3.12           The new Scottish Housing Regulator may not be best placed to make these types of assessments, given the range and complexity of issues involved.  In addition, assessments would need to consider the role of local authorities, community health partnerships and community planning partnerships, as well as service providers such as housing associations and voluntary organisations.

4.           Improving the Effectiveness of Regeneration and Neighbourhood Management at Local Level

4.1               The Scottish Government/COSLA Community Empowerment Action Plan provides welcome recognition of the value that “anchor” organisations such as CBHAs and development trusts can bring to community empowerment and regeneration.

4.2               The Action Plan is clear that empowered and engaged communities have a key part to play in tackling poor health and poverty, and in supporting people to become part of the social and economic mainstream. 

4.3               The Government and COSLA have said that they want to build on existing community empowerment schemes, structures and processes, rather than inventing new ones.  In this regard, the Action Plan recognises that community empowerment can take many different forms, for example through:

·        Community ownership of assets

·        Controlling budgets for the delivery of services at local level

·        Having a stake in shaping the services delivered by others

·       

Forty-eight Scottish towns will benefit from a share of millions of pounds of government cash to help revitalise their town centres and sustain jobs.

Nearly £40 million has been allocated in this round of funding out of the dedicated £60 million fund with applications invited for a £20 million second round to be shared out later this year.

It is estimated that the town centre projects will help support 640 jobs in Scotland.

Better retail, business, community and leisure facilities will be created, while many town centres will see public access and transport links improved. The funding will also kick start a number of town centre housing developments.

For a full list of who got what :

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Built-Environment/regeneration/town-centres/tcrf/FirstTrancheAllocations

Author: David Ainsworth, Third Sector Online

The Welsh Assembly and Big Lottery have set up a £13m fund to help Welsh community groups acquire public buildings and develop them to suit their needs.
“There are many public assets in Wales that are not being used to their full potential, and empowering the community to use these buildings to suit their needs is the main aim of this initiative,” said Leighton Andrews, deputy minister for regeneration. “This is a win-win situation.”

He said the programme would regenerate disused buildings and provide new facilities for third sector organisations.

Funding to acquire the buildings will come from the Welsh Assembly Government, and the money to develop them will come from the BLF, which will also process the applications. Organisations will be able to apply for cash from mid-October