Monday 24 September 2012

Holmleigh Nursing Home

Residents of Holmleigh Nursing Home (and their relatives) have been told that he home is to close.

The reason given is that there are structural problems with the building.

This all seems to be happening very quickly and is clearly going to be very disruptive for the elderly and in some cases very frail people living there.

(It also seems to be odd given that I saw renovation work going on there myself not that long ago)

Holmleigh is a private home but some of the residents' fees are paid by Liverpool City Council.

We've contacted the Council to find out what is going on and what is in place to help residents find somewhere else to live in what sounds like a rather short period of time.

This is not the first problem for Holmleigh. It had a couple of poor inspection reports not that long ago and I was actually invited in by a resident to see for myself what some of the problems were.

More news on Island Road

I blogged earlier about the news of plans to finally do something with the long empty building at number 24/26 Island Road.  This is the big one near the edge of the park that has not only been looking like an eyesore but has also been attracting dumping.

The good news was that South Liverpool Housing had both a plan, and the money, to turn the buildingn into four homes and bring it back into use.

A planning application has now gone in to the Council and you can find the details at this link

If you have points you want to make about the plans, you can do this either on line through the Council website or in writing. 

Please bear in mind that it can take a while for all the details to appear on the site so if they are not all there yet it's worth checking back.

Tuesday 18 September 2012

Money for local groups - update

The Cressington Community First Panel has a new website which includes a link to the application form.

Cressington Community First is a fund which gets its money from the Government.

We have more than £30,000 to spend on grants for local activities.  We awarded the first lot earlier this year and are looking forward to more applications.

The link to the new website is here

Police and Crime Commissioner

This November we are having elections for the Elected Police and Crime Commissioner.  These are new roles and there'll be one of these elected in Merseyside to replace the Police Authority.

I have been selected as the Liberal Democrat Candidate in this election.

I'll be blogging about police and crime related issues here as well as about the other campaigns I'm involved in and about developments in South Liverpool.

But for those who only want to read Police and Crime Commissioner material, I'll be posting that on my linked blog which is at www.paula4merseyside.blogspot.com

Friday 7 September 2012

Greenhill Nursery site update

People living in the Nursery Road and Long Lane area have been wondering for some time now what the Council plans to do with the former Greenhill Nursery site.

We now know that the Council says it doesn't need the land itself and is thinking about options for how it can be used.

There'll be a report leading to a decision.

Obviously its important that local people have as much say as possible at this early stage as well as when any planning application might come along.

My colleague Richard Oglethorpe has written to people living very near the site to ask for their views and he is keen to get opinions from local people (whether you got a letter or not)

This will give him a chance to influence what the Council puts in its report.

If you want to contact Richard its best to do it directly at richard.oglethorpe@liverpool.gov.uk

Thursday 6 September 2012

Island Road - update

People living in the Island Road have asked frequently about the big empty building at number 24 and 26.  It's been boarded up and vacant for quite some time now and apart from potentially providing a dumping ground, it makes the road look bad.

Anyway, we've followed up on this recently and the owners, South Liverpool Housing, tell us they have plans to turn it into four homes. With any luck they may be on site doing work later this Autumn.

My colleague Richard has written to people living near the building to give them a bit of an update on this and when I get more news I will update here too.

Wednesday 5 September 2012

St Mary's Road alcohol sales decision - update

Richard Oglethorpe and I went along today to the Council's licensing committee to represent local people.

We planned to speak against an application to sell alcohol 24 hours a day, seven days a week, from the petrol station on the bit of St Mary's Road where it starts to go into the village.  This is the one by ASDA and also reasonably near the Garston Adventure Playground.

We had petitions signed by local residents wanting us to object for a range of reasons, including potential nuisance and likelihood of anti social behaviour.

Well I had promised to update on the decision today but we actually don't have one.

The committee decided to postpone the discussion and decision because it wanted a bit more information from the company applying (called Gat Oil).  There is a licensing law issue about when a petrol station is not a petrol station (in other words the balance between the sale of petrol and the sale of other things in the shop).  The company had provided a three months sales graph but the committee felt they needed a longer time frame to look at.

The issue here is that the company has to show that the place is in effect a convenience store based on sales ratios to get anywhere with the application.  If that is done, then there are still all the objections to go through.  (This is governed by law and apologies if it sounds vague - I am not a licensing lawyer!)

So basically Richard and I kept our powder dry and will go again on 8th October to speak up for local residents (no point in giving away all our best points!)

Richard and I were the only politicians there to represent the people in Garston.  And as the cut off date for objections has now gone it is impossible for others to suddenly decide this is important.

I have to say that given there are potentially six councillors for that patch (the petrol station being right by a ward boundary) the lack of interest shown by five of them is not impressive.

Anyway, I will update again when I have more information.