Tag: Lee Green

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Six Lee Green Community Projects In Line For NCIL Funding

Manor House Gardens is in line to benefit from nearly £10,000 in NCIL grants

Lewisham Council is proposing to give NCIL grants to six of the 13 applications it received. The final decision rests with the Mayor and Cabinet when it meets next month.

The Neighbourhood Community Infrastructure Levy (NCIL) is cash the Council receives from developers, similar to Section 106 levies. This time it had £27,950.93 available for Lee Green, but received applications amounting to just over £110,000.

The six projects which have been recommended are:

  • £7,500 to upgrade the play equipment in the Manor House Gardens playground. This includes a replacement cradle swing.
  • £6,000 for the Christmas tree and lights on the forecourt of Hither Green station, for the next two years.
  • £6,000 to fund an inter-generational gardening project on the Newstead estate. The aim is to increase the knowledge of planting, garden maintenance, growing vegetables and recycling among residents and children.
  • £6,000 to Lee Fair Share, to fund weekly Coffee, Cake and Company sessions, including weekly Chair Exercise sessions.
  • £2,450 to the Lee Manor Society and the Friends of Manor House Gardens to renovate the large bed at the north end of the Gardens, near Manor House library.
The Big Bed in Manor House Gardens which needs rescuing.

All six projects were endorsed by a meeting of the Lee Green Assembly last week, but still need final approval before work can begin.

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Threat to Local Assemblies in Lewisham

Lewisham Council is planning to stop supporting the local assemblies in the borough, as an economy measure. The staff who have helped run them are facing redundancy.

The assemblies were introduced in 2007 for people to voice their concerns and to help identify solutions. There was one for every ward, including Lee Green.

Lewisham’s website says:

Local assemblies are community-based open forums aiming to actively involve, consult, empower and learn from residents and those working and studying in Lewisham Council’s local wards.

They’re your chance to:

  • find out what is happening in your ward
  • discuss and share what matters to you
  • work with your councillors and others to identify solutions and shape the future of your neighbourhood

Initially, Lewisham provided £25,000 a year to each assembly. It also funded a secretariat who helped organise and promote the assembly meetings and provided other support. The cash has already been withdrawn and now the Council wants to cut the administrative support as well.

A recent report of a “Safer Stronger Communities Select Committee” meeting said the 2019 Democracy Review “had found Assemblies to be unrepresentative: they engaged already democratically engaged residents and did not attract seldom-heard communities.”

A subsequent meeting set out in more detail the implications of the cutback, which would save £203,000 a year – although the redundancy costs would reduce that figure in the first year.

Lee Green Assembly Meeting, October.

The most recent meeting of the Lee Green assembly, when a representative from Galliard provided an update on the Leegate development was attended by 43 people.

If the cuts go ahead, local people will be free to keep the assemblies going but without Council support.

Jim Mallory, Chair of the Lee Green Consortium, said “I am sure none of us is in any doubt that the Council faces tough decisions, many of which will still have to be taken despite a new Government. However, my concern is that there doesn’t seem to have been any consultation about a proposal that is in essence at the core of the Council’s commitment to consultation.

“As Assemblies were intended to help overcome the democratic deficit, their loss would be regrettable, no matter what any understandable shortcomings they might have.