Schools meeting sets tasks for county council

Around 70 parents attended the meeting about school places in the Alban Arena on Monday night. Parents were able to give vent to their frustrations with the system direct to county council officials. Various key themes emerged, including:
– Concern about the performance of some local secondary schools
– Concern over the continuing interest list (and particularly whether t was appropriate for someone who had got a place allocated to them to continue to have priority on the list over those who had received none of their ranked applications)
– Concern over specific operations of the siblings rule (and whether it was fair for parents who had moved to continue to benefit from the operations of the siblings rule)
– Concern of the effect of distance criteria on those in villages.
I hope that the county council will make available a full set of minutes in due course.

In the meantime I have asked the Administration to ensure that the meet with SABLE, the organisation which expresses concerns over the lack of primary school places.

Secondary schools admissions public meeting

As readers will know, there has been a great increase in the numbers of children who have not received one of their ranked secondary school places. This is not confined to the villages – over 50 families have this year been affected in St Albans city.

We are therefore calling a public meeting so that parents can hear first hand from county council officials what their options are for this year and can help inform the discussions local councillors are having with county hall about how these problems can be avoided in future.

The meeting will be on Monday 30 March at 7.00 pm in Committee Rooms 1 and 2 at the District Council offices.

Major signage review in central St Albans

I have been involved in a major review of signage in St Albans. There are various reasons for this:

1. The new electronic car park signs will show how many spaces each of the five central car parks will have. There also need to be signs guiding drivers to the car park they have chosen once they have read the information on the electronic sign.
2. There is a complete lack of logic in the existing direction signage: some signs send you to the M1 or M25, others mention destinations like Dunstable even though few enough people would head for Dunstable as such. Some old signs need removing and new more helpful signs put up.

The overall effect should be to have fewer cars driving around aimlessly looking for parking places and causing congestion.

In addition, there are issues like local directions: why do we signpost some places of worship (eg the Abbey) and not others (eg other mainstream churches and the mosques)? Why are some very small places of worship advertised and not those with self-evidently big congregations? Should we signpost schools or not? Your thoughts would be welcome.

Flooding problems

I have been pressing for some time to ensure that action is taken by Herts Highways to deal with the ‘ponding’ at the junction of Sandpit Lane and Beechwood Avenue. They now say that money has been found to do this. When precisely this will happen is, as ever with Herts Highways, another matter.

If there are any other areas which need attention and which you think I may have missed please let me know. I am already pressing for the problem at the junction of Verulam Road and High Street, as well as that on Woodstock Road South, to be dealt with.

Update on highways issues

Herts Highways report back to me as follows:

Bedford Road – As you are aware, we are attending to carry out pavement
repairs on the badly damaged section of footpath which has been damaged by
heavy vehicles. In the interim I met with SADC’s Senior Waste Management
Officer to explain the seriousness of the issue. SADC have agreed to not
enter the road unless they can keep all 4 wheels on the carriageway. I will
continue to monitor the situation to establish how successful this
arrangement is.

Churchill Road – The badly damaged pavements have been ordered for repair
and the homeowner has now agreed to cover some of the cost of the repairs.
I hope to resolve this matter once and for all shortly.

I have recently been surveying the roads in St Albans to asses the extent
of the damage caused by the recent wintery weather. I have taken you recent
queries into account whilst doing this. Among the roads for repair are
Grosvenor Road, Alma Road, Hatfield Road and I am just looking into what
can be done as a priority about Woodstock Road.

School places worry?

Secondary transfer allocations have again caused worries this year. There are many more city centre children who have not been allocated a place of their choice than last year.

Leaving aside the simple political issue of why the county council allows this to happen in St Albans and south west herts year after year, here is some simple advice:
– DO appeal
– DON’T turn down a place offered by the county council: you may need it if all else fails (and accepting wlll not affect your appeal)
– DO appeal for more than one school: this again will not prejudice your chances of succeeding for one of the schools
– DO put your child on the continuing interest list.

If you need more detailed advice contact your COUNTY councillor (the district council has no role in education). If you are unsure of who your county councillor is feel free to contact me and I will tell or find out for you.

Yellow lines at the junction of Churchill Road with Jennings Road

The traffic order has been issued and responses are coming in. Herts Highways will be assessing these and seeing whether there are any objections. They will then advise local councillors whether or not to overrule objections. This decision would be taken at a meeting of the Highways Forum, a county council committee which meets locally in the district council offices.

Chris calls for better Post Office solutions

Chris White spoke at the weekend at his Party conference and called for the Post Office to be turned into a mutual organisation, with a substantial share ownership by staff.

He also called for tighter regulation of the the Post Office’s competitors.

On the recent post office closures consultation he said: ‘This was simply dishonest. The consultation in St Albans was geographically illiterate. It was also apparent that any successful campaign to save a Post office was likely to be met by the closure of a different Post Office.’

He felt that the Essex County Council scheme under which local authorities took over post offices would mean little more than the problem being shifted from one area to another.