The 33rd Annual General Meeting was held at the Salvation Army Citadel, Psalter Lane, at 7.30pm on Thursday 18th May 06. The meeting was chaired by Richard Ward and some 22 people were present.
Apart from the normal business we were presented with an account of the proposed Sheffield Development Framework by Ben Benest of the City Planning Department. This is a 15-year plan devised to improve the employment, transport and environmental aspects of Sheffield city life. After the consultation process is complete it will replace the Unitary Development Plan towards the end of next year. Specifically in Nether Edge this will lead to more stringent planning conditions to ensure that the essential character of the area is maintained. There will be limits on housing development in NE, the proportion of restaurants to shops on eg Ecclesall Road will be controlled and there will be a new recycling centre in the SW. There was a lively question session where questions were raised about housing density, public transport and road traffic.
Richard Ward stated that the work of the committee had been constrained by a lack of "person power" but activities such as the production of Edge had been maintained. Unfortunately, with Michael Barkham's resignation, the Planning and Development Sub-Committee had failed to get going, but Rick Cryer had been monitoring the weekly planning applications on the Council website and John Mackinder had been inspecting contentious applications. Chris Venables had organised NENG support for the CSV "Make a Difference" day; NENG had made representation to maintain local bus services and had attended Area Panels and road shows.
Richard was standing down after 6 years as Secretary then Chairman, but unfortunately there had been no nominations for a replacement Chair; volunteers would be welcomed!
During the year, ten General Committee meetings were well attended. However, both Michael Barkham and Dominic Watts were obliged to retire because of work commitments and John Mackinder because of moving away from Sheffield. Thus new members are urgently being sought.
Ten issues of Edge have been edited and designed by Committee members, one with as many as 20 pages. The contents depend on a regular flow of items from NENG members and Nether Edge residents. Michael also thanked John West for his crossword puzzles and for maintaining the NENG website.
Elaine Bird presented the accounts, which were accepted by the meeting. Although membership had increased, there was a growing proportion of retired subscribers paying £2 p.a.; Edge cost about £2.70 per member p.a. so costs were barely being covered and printing costs were increasing. No paid advertisements were accepted and subscription has not risen for over 3 years so it would be prudent to increase subscriptions for the year commencing April 2007. She proposed that membership rates should then be increased to £6 for earning members and £3 for non-earning subscribers. This motion was seconded by Chris Venables and carried unanimously by a show of hands.
In Rick Cryer's absence, presented his report. Membership has increased by 12 to 826. During the year we tried out a scheme in which all the sub-distributors were given around 10 extra copies of Edge which they then delivered as complimentary copies to households which were not members; this generated around 10 new members. The marginal cost of printing the complimentary copies is not great and this scheme could be repeated at a larger scale — as long as sub-distributors are willing to deliver them! We have a great team of willing distributors and sub-distributors but inevitably illness, injury and annual holidays can leave us with gaps in our cover. It is therefore important to have a list of volunteers who could step in at short notice when problems arise. Anyone willing to go on this reserve list please contact Rick Cryer. The Membership Secretary also thanked Alan Hartland for having made his job so much easier.
Wildlife Watch
Howard Trott reported that membership was 56, an increase of 8. Several indoor meetings had been held at the Kings Centre covering Sheffield's city trees, badgers, a slide show on birds and on the future of wildlife in Sheffield. Outdoor meetings had included visits to two nature reserves, a woodland walk and assisting with the meadow planting in Chelsea Park and with a clear up on Brincliffe Edge Woods in conjunction with Street Force. Howard thanked NENG for their grant of £150; they had £127 in the bank and would be able to hold the subscription to £3 pa.
Local Environment
Chris Venables reported on the October 2005 clear-up around the shops and Chelsea Park and street bulb planting organised in conjunction with CSV's "Make a Difference day". The bulbs had now made an appearance. She had also recently negotiated for funds from the Area Panel budget to have plant troughs provided near the shops. These will be supplied, planted and maintained by the Council. Marian Tylecote added that 15 new species of primarily traditional wildflower plants were to be introduced in Chelsea Park, with 5 types already planted. These should appear during the summer.
The proposed appointment of Josephine Maltby to act as Auditor was agreed.
The following nominations were accepted:-
Chairman No nomination Vice Chairman Christine Venables Treasurer Elaine Bird Membership Secretary Rick Cryer Secretary Michael Miller Committee Members Marian Tylecote
In the absence of other nominations current members were re-elected.
Lynda Mitchell also volunteered to join the committee. For a full updated list see General Committee.
The meeting closed at 9.10 pm.
Reports of earlier meetings may be seen as follows:- 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002 and 2001.