Crowdfunding Kent: KCC supports community-led recovery

As part of our commitment to supporting communities and Kent’s recovery from the pandemic, KCC has launched Crowdfund Kent with crowdfunding platform Spacehive. Crowdfund Kent will support community groups and projects that aid recovery from the Covid crisis, such as improvements to community facilities or initiatives that address financial distress or social isolation. KCC is contributing £500,000 in total and will allocate up to £20,000 or 50% of the project cost (more in exceptional circumstances in deprived areas) to individual schemes. 

I will be taking part in a webinar launch of the initiative on 17 March (details in the KCC media hub press release) and there will be further workshops to help develop schemes in March and April. The deadline for submitting schemes in this funding round is 28 April.

First steps on the road to recovery

The national road map to easing and ultimately ending Covid restrictions is very welcome. The pace may be cautious, but steady progress is surely preferable to measures that raise expectations but then have to take a step back or even be reversed. And all the while, the vaccination programme is making rapid progress.

I commented about the four key actions which we’ve tried to focus on in Kent - following the guidelines, symptom free testing (315,000 tests carried out in Kent, more than 2,000 symptom-free people tested positive and so able to self-isolate), contact tracing and enforcement. We’ll continue these actions in the weeks to come. Kent has come a very long way since New Year: from a 7 day figure of 900 cases per 100,000 and a high national outlier to 66.6 per 100,000 and just over half the national average. It’s a huge tribute to what people and communities across Kent have done; if we sustain that, we will stay on the road to recovery.

You can find the KCC press release here.

Anti-social parking near Knole: restrictions renewed

Kent County Council has issued an Order for no waiting at any time, to be applied to a number of roads that have been affected by inconsiderate (and in a number of places potentially dangerous) parking by visitors to Knole Park. This renews the order first issued last year, and then renewed in the run up to Christmas (and which was due to expire at the end of the month). 

The issue affects residents in Seal Parish in my Division, as well as those in neighbouring areas (including those represented by my County colleagues Margaret Crabtree and Peter Lake). A longer-term solution needs to be developed and I recently held a very useful meeting with those concerned with the issue, including local representatives, County and District representatives (both councillors and officers), Seal Parish Council and others. This will continue as we seek to develop solutions; in the meantime, continuation of the restrictions is essential.

The roads affected are:

A225 Tonbridge Road – both sides for the full length of the road

 

The Rise – both sides for the full length of the road

 

St Julian’s Road, Underriver – both sides for the full length of the road

 

Fawke Wood Road, Seal – both sides for the full length of the road

 

Weald Road – both sides for the full length of the road

 

Turners Gardens – both sides for the full length of the road

 

Shenden Way - both sides for the full length of the road

 

White Hart Close - both sides for the full length of the road

 

Road Connecting St Julian’s Road With Park Lane - both sides for the full length of the road

Council tax - Helping Hands for hard-pressed residents

KCC has today confirmed a programme of help for hard-pressed residents with their council tax set out in last week’s 2020-21 budget.

Under the scheme, funded by some £6 million of the support that KCC has received from the government’s Emergency Covid-19 Grant, all those already under the Council Tax Reduction Scheme (CTRS), which provides discounts to those on the lowest incomes, will receive a rebate of £50 on their council tax bills. This will also help those who join the Scheme during the financial year, perhaps because of a sudden change in their circumstances such as redundancy. 

In addition, KCC is providing supplementary funding to District and Borough Councils to extend their existing Council Tax Hardship Fund schemes. These schemes are intended to help those who are - or were prior to the pandemic - ‘just about managing’ but above the income levels that would make them eligible for the CTRS. In this case too, the policy aims to help those who have been affected by the pandemic and its economic consequences. 

This announcement follows last week’s launch of the £10 million Helping Hands scheme by the council, providing support to businesses, households in financial distress, the voluntary sector and those in need of help in securing access to the digital technology that we all increasingly rely on. This too is funded by the Covid Emergency Grant; in both cases this is one-off funding that we as a council have decided to use to support those most impacted by Covid and its economic and social consequences. 

Last week’s KCC budget was aimed at protecting our services - especially those, such as adults’ and children’s social services that are likely to see a sharp increase in need and in more complex cases as we come out of lockdown. It also aimed to secure the long-term financial stability of the council - a council that is strong enough to be able to help when it is needed. The consequence of that, though reluctantly on the part of the administration, was a 2% increase in general council tax levels and a 3% increase in the adult social care precept. We were determined to ensure that the most hard-pressed households were relieved of the pressures of a council tax increase, and that is what these measures aim to do.

Bollards replaced in Holmesdale Road

The bollards in Holmesdale Road near Giffords Cottages which I funded from my Member Grant in 2016 were knocked down by a car at the end of October. Tomorrow (Saturday 30 January) will see a road closure between the junctions with Devon Road and East Hill to enable Kent Highways to replace the bollards. The closure is scheduled for between 8 am and 2 pm.

Renewing the footpath from Copse Bank

Tomorrow sees the start of the closure of Public Right of Way SU4/ SR165 in Seal, running from just off Childsbridge Lane (the closure starts by Ragstones) to the A25 opposite Trinity School and the Weald of Kent annex. This is for very welcome works to improve the footpath.

The improvement was agreed as a planning condition (condition 14) of the approval of the expansion of Trinity School. The Parish Council advocated strongly for this as a means of encouraging local students to take a safe route to walk or cycle to the schools on the former Wildernesse site, and I took this up at the time with KCC officers. It was proposed as part of the application in early 2019 that a £10,000 contribution be made for the improvement of SR165 - see paragraphs 46 and 52 of the report to the KCC Planning Applications Committee in January 2019). The steady addition of years of entry for Weald of Kent, and the subsequent confirmation of the establishment of an annex for Tunbridge Wells Grammar School for Boys, have added to the case for it.

Delivery of this has taken some time - a key Memorandum of Understanding relating to this project is dated December 2018 - and I have, on behalf of the Parish Council, taken this up a number of times. It is now set to take place. The footpath is closed from tomorrow for up to 21 days.

More testing sites, including Sevenoaks Community Centre

Following last week’s announcement, KCC today announced the opening of five additional symptom-free (asymptomatic) testing centres in the course of this week. This will bring the total across the county to 19, including two in Sevenoaks District. The second of these, opening on Friday, is in the Sevenoaks Community Centre in Cramptons Road, Bat and Ball. This should be very accessible for residents of Sevenoaks North and Darent Valley, especially in areas such as Otford.

The asymptomatic testing programme in Kent has now carried out over 50,000 tests, and this figure should now rise rapidly. The current 14 sites can carry out 14,000 tests per day, and this should rise to 19,000 by the end of the week.

You can find KCC’s media release about the new openings here.