North Yorkshire Police to discuss increase in crime levels tomorrow

A meeting tomorrow (Tuesday) will hear how the  Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner intends to tackle an increase in crime levels in the area.  The meeting will be told that there some 3837 crimes reported during September.

Across the whole of North Yorkshire, including York, the Guildhall Ward had the largest number of crimes (212).

 In York it was followed by Huntington (91) and Westfield (79).

The largest proportion of crimes in York relate to violence (457), followed by theft (390), arson/criminal damage (153) and burglary (120). Perhaps surprisingly only 47 drug offences were reported.

Overall across the county there has been a 2.5% increase in crime levels this year so far compared to 12 months ago. Over the last two years the increase has been 16%. The biggest increase has been in public order offences. Violence against the person offences have increased from 5504 in 2017 to 7747 this year (up 40%)

There has been an increase in shoplifting in York this year. Recorded anti-social behaviour has however shown a reduction (-17%)

The scale of the problems with the Police switchboard are revealed.

222 calls to 999 were abandoned during August.

 There is a similar picture on 101 calls where 6050 were abandoned during July.

Time to answer on both channels improved during September.

The Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner and police staff deserve credit for producing figures which can be accessed via the web. Click here   The sheer size of the county, and its diversity, make it difficult to produce performance stats which are both accessible and relevant to local neighbourhoods.

There is some good work going on at neighbourhood level with police in west York proactively checking security issues this week

There will, however, be niggling doubts about some aspects of crime prevention.

Lack of reports of drug related crime is probably not the right way to access the scale of that issue.

Equally worrying is the failure of the force to recruit up to its budgeted staff numbers. There were estill over 30 vacancies for police officers in the force in September. The police don’t expect to hit their target number (1450 officers) until December. There are also 36 vacancies for PCSOs.

Performance stats for the Fire service can be viewed by clicking here

Increase in graffiti reports in York

There has been an increase in the number of cases of graffiti reported to the York Council over the last 30 months.

During the first quarter of the financial year 20% of residents surveyed said that vandalism, graffiti and other deliberate damage to property or vehicles was a problem in their local area.

This is the highest level ever recorded in responses to the Councils “customer panel” survey.

According to the Police web site, there were 119  instances of criminal damage and arson recorded in the York area during the most recent month for which stats are available (August 2019).

During the 12 month period up to August there have been 1619 reports in total.

The Council recently advertised for two new members of staff who will be responsible for removing graffiti from public locations in the City.

It is unclear whether they will also help to apply anti graffiti coatings to vulnerable walls (see right)

Councillors have access to “graffiti removal kits”.

Time to tackle the hedges

We were pleased to here that the JoRo housing team have agreed to trim back hedges from Bellhouse Way near their Woodlands estate. The path there is obstructed as it is further round near The Gallops, although the problem there involves a more hazardous thorn hedge.

Some of the hedges to the rear of Foxwood Lane are also obstructing footpaths.

The Council will be dealing with these issues

JRHT will trim back hedges near their Woodlands estate
Gathering of milk bottles where the slide used to be on the Teal Drive playground. We’ve requested a tidy up
Thorn hedges like this one near The Gallops junction are a safety risk as darker nights approach
Householders are being asked to cut hedges back form public footpaths
With heavy rainfall expected, it is important to report blocked drainage gullies. This is a particular issue at the moment because of increased leaf fall and inadequate weed clearance during the summer months. Blockages can result in localised flooding

Dog fouling still a problem

Snickets fouled in Foxwood

There is still too much dog fouling going on in parts of York. Owners who do not clean up after their pets can face an on the spot fine of £75. This could be increased to £1000 if the case goes to a magistrates court.

You can report a fouled footpath by clicking here

If you spot a full poop scoop bin it can be reported via this link

The Council says, “If a dog bin is full or overflowing, we’ll empty it within 2 hours. If we get your report after 3.00pm, then the dog bin will be emptied before 10.00am the following working day.

If a bin is damaged or missing we’ll repair or replace it as soon as possible”.

Weed spraying inspection lists obtained by York Councillor

Osbaldwick Councillor Mark Warters has obtained a copy of the schedules used to check on the progress being made with weed control spraying in York this summer.

Inspection report extract

They reveal that only a small proportion of roads were checked by local officials. A substantial payment has been made to the contractors based on this evidence.

Surprisingly those that were checked apparently showed signs of weed “die back”. This contrasts with some of the photographic evidence accumulated by local residents.

The list confirms that many streets and surrounding areas were not included on the spraying lists.

The main issue now relates to how next years weed control programme will be managed.

Contrasting views on the effectiveness of weed control programmes in the Westfield area

A59 weeds finally gone..leaf clearance starts,

Its taken over 4 months, but weed growth has finally been cleared from the drainage channels on the A59 near Poppleton. The work, undertaken yesterday by Council staff, has improved the appearance of this key entry into the City

Weeds on the A59 reported in early July
A59 gutters clear of weeds (17th October 2019)
The only area left to treat is the slip road onto Longfield Lane.

It remains unclear how far the Councils weed control contractors have got with their “3rd application” of weed killer.

Attention will now switch to the autumn leaf removal programme. This is due to start on Monday. It will last for about 8 weeks.

Councillors have been briefed in the following terms,

“The leaf clearance will be undertaken using both mechanical and manual means.

We will have two trailer drawn leaf vacuums, our teams will use these to remove leaves from pavements and grass verges.

Our two large mechanical sweepers will be targeted at streets with trees, using the local knowledge of our staff, members and reports made by residents.

These leaves cannot be recycled because they are cleared from nearby or on the roads and are treated as contaminated waste.

As always we cannot see and clear every street at one time, so we would be grateful for the following

  1. If you aware of leaves that are causing a ‘danger’ i.e. on a major footpath, near a school, elderly persons home etc.  and are wet and slippery, please report these to member enquiries, if not a ‘danger’ please monitor and we will get there!
  • Once the main leaf fall is over, if there are leaves, which appear to have been missed, please pass these through member enquires.

You may be interested to know that the Communities and Equalities team, who work with volunteers across the city have recently ‘enrolled’ about a dozen volunteer leaf clearers.

They are also working with volunteers from Goodgym to clear leaves from large grassed areas in the parks and these are recycled in leaf bays within the parks”.

Road repairs – little progress by York Council

The Councils Executive committee will discuss the vexed question of highways maintenance next week.
Foxwood Lane

If there is any basic public service likely to raise public ire,  it is the number of potholes and cracks in roads and footpaths.

 The conditions simply reflect many years of under investment in maintenance work.

The new Council was elected on a manifesto which promised improvements. They quickly moved to allocate an additional £1 million budget although half of this was earmarked for new cycling and footpath projects.

School Street

The expectation was that the, all too obvious, major problems would be quickly identified and a programme agreed for repairs. Anyone reading the report will be very disappointed.  There is no refreshed list of roads that will be resurfaced this year.

Officials even plead for existing policies to continue.

Councillors have had long enough to get a list of repairs on a ward by ward basis. With only 6 months to go in the current financial year, contracts for these repairs needed to be issued quickly.

Ideally this should have been done before ice took a further toll on the vulnerable surfaces of poorly maintained surfaces.

Morrell Court

The report talks of an annual condition survey. The survey details condition of every highway. All are graded between 1 and 5 with 5 being those in worst condition. (Grade 1: very good, • Grade 2: good, • Grade 3: fair, • Grade 4: poor, • Grade 5: very poor)

Over 13,000 stretches of highway are categorised as grade 5

That is little help.

A more detailed assessment is needed if the worst roads are to be prioritised.

The list is available for download from “open data” click here It is unfortunately categorised by ward names which were superceded over 15 years ago.

Walton Place

Still we can say that streets like Foxwood Lane and School Street are amongst the worst in the City. The 50 year old potholed access roads to Spurr Court and Morrel Court are graded at 4 (poor). Footpaths in streets like Walton Place don’t even get a mention.

We hope that Councillors will ask some searching questions next week.

All is not as it should be with highway maintenance operations at the York Council.

Fall-out from Balloon Fiesta noise complaints

The Council has admitted that it received a lot of complaints about noise levels experienced during the Balloon Fiesta which took place on the Knavesmire at the end of September.

The noise complaints didn’t relate to the balloons themselves (which mostly failed to get off the ground because of weather conditions).

The event was organised by Events and Attractions Limited, a York based company.

Officials of the Council firmly put the blame for lack of control on the premises license holder for the Knavesmire. This they identify as “Make it York”.

 Make it York is the secretive QUANGO set up by the Council several years ago to run tourism and promotional events in the City.  

Make it York were apparently told that a statutory noise nuisance was witnessed by Council officials over weekend of the 27th and 28th September.

According to an email seen by a local Councillor,

“Make it York were asked to provide details of how they were going to prevent any further recurrences of noise nuisance from events at the Knavesmire and they have, as a result, submitted an application for a minor variation to the existing  premises licence. This application requests that an additional condition is added to the existing premises licence and will require Make it York to submit a noise management plan for approval by City of York Council within two months of the licence being varied. Once approved the noise management plan would be implemented immediately for any events held on the Knavesmire and operated under the premises licence”.

“It is anticipated that any submitted noise management plan will identify all potential noise sources associated with events taking place on the and provide details on strategies which will be implemented to minimise the disturbance caused to residents from those sources, especially those activities where amplified music is involved. It is also anticipated that any submitted noise management plan will also detail methods for monitoring and controlling the noise and how Make it York will respond to any noise complaint received in the future.

 As a result of the above it is the view of officers in Public Protection that such a condition should, if implemented correctly and adhered to, result in any noise from events taking place on the Knavesmire, and operated under the premises licence, being reduced to a satisfactory level such that it shouldn’t cause any further noise nuisance”.

The issue comes to a head at a difficult time for tourism support organisations in the region. “Welcome to Yorkshire” had to sack their Chief Executive following allegations of extravagance. The organisation subsequently had to be bailed out by taxpayers with a new Chairman promising more transparency in the future.

“Make it York” is likely to be subject to similar calls.

It receives a substantial taxpayer subsidy, but its meetings are held behind closed doors.

The only sliver of accountability comes through brief and infrequent updates to a Council committee. The Council nominates two representatives to the Make it York 12 person Board (currently Cllrs Mason and Taylor)

According to the organisation’s web site, “The current turnover of Make It York is around £4.8 million per annum, generated commercially from a range of revenue sources. Other than any dividends payable to the Shareholder, any surplus is invested back into the city.

With respect to its corporate structure, Make It York is a private limited company limited by shares and has an independent Board of Directors.

 Its sole Shareholder is City of York Council”

Residents anger over Council plan to remove security railings

Local residents in Lowfields are objecting to plans to remove the railings which protect their garden boundaries.

The plan by the Council to replace the railings was first revleaed on tyhis site at the weekend.

According to their Facebook site, the Lowfields Residents Action Group is leading a campaign to get the Council to consult neighbours on their plans.

Their main concerns are about the appearance of a new fence, its impact on the natural environment, damage to existing landscaping and the money which would be wasted if the existing railings – which are in good condition – were junked.

Separately the Council has announced today that it will commence construction work on the site in two weeks time.

It is writing to residents telling them about a consultation meeting which is taking place next week and which will involve the Wates building contractors

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The Residents Group has responded saying, “We think this is pretty short notice for a consultation event.

The letter includes an evasive reference to “Yorspace” who we understand are still struggling to find funding for their communal living site.

It also pointedly doesn’t admit that the Council have failed to find a developer for their proposed elderly persons care home.

Nothing more either, on the public buildings (Health Centre and Police station) which seem less and less likely now to happen.

This means that there is no chance of building work on the whole site being finished within 2 years”.