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Dear Members, As the end of 2021 draws closer, we want to thank you for keeping your membership with ESALC as we navigated our transition in the first few months of the year from SSALC to ESALC. We now feel very settled with our new and independent East Sussex status and hope you have found the services on offer both relevant and beneficial. As you know, we are here to attempt to make your jobs that little bit easier so please do let us know if you would like to see anything done differently, or if you feel there is anything missing from the services we currently deliver. A bit of news.. NALC Points of Light It was great to read about Etchingham and Battle in NALC’s Points of Light recently, which is a collection of case studies highlighting the important work that parish and town councils are undertaking to support their communities. Etchingham PC have introduced the Emma Beeney Award to reward outstanding service to the village of Etchingham. The award will be given out every year that nominations are received. Battle Town Council developed a plan to repair and improve the Grade II listed Almonry Building with three key elements in mind: to provide excellent services to residents, support town development and economic growth and preserving the heritage of Battle. Works commenced in April 2021. To read more, see the following link: https://www.nalc.gov.uk/news/entry/1854-nalc-publishes-the-2021-edition-of-points-of-light Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Weekend 2022 You may have already read about the planned celebrations which are due to take place on the weekend of 2nd – 5th June 2022 and as part of these celebrations there will be The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Beacons. There is no lieutenancy pressure on councils to take part in this particular initiative where there is a hope that 70 Beacons will be lit throughout each County at 9:15 on 2nd June 2022, with each Beacon representing a year in the life of the 70 year Reign of our Queen. More information can be found at the following link: www.queensjubileebeacons.com CSAG Update The Community Safety Advisory Groups (CSAGS) have worked very well within Wealden and it has been decided that this model will be rolled out across all parts of Sussex, with good contact having already been established in Rother and Lewes. PCC Focus Groups For the past two years an exercise is repeated every 6 months where towns and parishes are approached to gauge views on how policing in an area has improved or deteriorated in the preceding 6 months. Priority issues are identified and then fed back to the Chief Constable and the PCC. It’s that time of year already and Trevor Leggo and Mandy Jameson (on behalf of Sussex Police) are meeting with parish and town councils at the moment to discuss any issues. If your council is not already involved but would like to be then please get in contact with Emily on admin@esalc.co.uk A brief recap on 2021 so far… ESALC Training Programme We are really pleased with how our 2021 training programme has developed throughout the year and it has been great to see so many attendees at many of our online sessions. At the time of writing, we have had over 200 attendees at our virtual training sessions and have carried out a number of face to face meetings for full council training. We have successfully delivered training in the following areas: New/Refresher Councillors, Chairman, Planning, Finance, Social Media, New Clerks, Time Management, Leadership, Elections/Purdah and Code of Conduct. Your feedback is always valued so please do let us know if there are areas you feel could be improved, and it goes without saying that we are happy to tailor courses should your council require it. All event dates can be found on our website and these are regularly sent via email, but for more information please contact Emily on admin@esalc.co.uk Clerks and Chairman’s Forum Our Clerks Forums have been a great success and we are pleased to announce our final one of the year will take place on December 3rd at 10.30am. Our next Chairman’s Forum will take place on December 6th at 7pm and we will be joined by Ian Davison as well as Oli Fisher from the Rural Crime Team. Emily will send out the Zoom links nearer the time but we hope to see as many of you there as possible (Christmas hats are optional but always welcome). Clerks Directory We recently shared the East Sussex Clerks Directory and hope this has been a useful tool enabling you to reach out to other clerks and support each other either professionally or socially. It would be lovely to hear if any local WhatsApp groups, or real life social events have been arranged as a result of it. Finally… I am trying to establish how local councils communicate information to parishes. Other than website, social media, post, newsletter or local parish magazine – is there another way you are successfully reaching your residents to relay important news? Don’t forget… Project management If you have any projects that require skilled management at reasonable cost, Dee Thornton has a background with Capita, the NHS and the water industry and has recently successfully completed multiple projects with a local council in West Sussex. Dee can be contacted at deethornton@btinternet.com Finally, we are always on the lookout for any interesting news from our parishes that they might wish to share with others. If you have something that can be published in our next Newsletter, please contact Emily on admin@esalc.co.uk Best wishes The ESALC team |
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