The Labour Council “Cabinet” has confirmed that it is still considering introducing a charge for the emptying of green waste bins.

However the decision has slipped once again – this time to their February meeting.

In effect this means that they cannot introduce charges during the current financial year. In turn this could mean that a hole will appear in their budget and will raise concerns that even higher charges for some services will be implemented next year.

The Council are still promising to consult on their plans using the internet. When they intend to do so remains a mystery.

This what Labour have done in Sheffield where they have also privatised waste collection. https://www.sheffield.gov.uk/environment/waste/bincollections/greenbins.html

All York Council departments missed their target of dealing with residents complaints within 5 working days between September and November.

43 complainants were recorded as “not satisfied” and went on to record a “stage 2” complaint.

A further 3 complaints reached the highest “stage 3” level.

The Council have admitted that very little existing furniture will be moved to their offices at Toft Green.

Instead a contract has been let which will see some of the furniture refurbished and resold, some donated to charity and some dumped.

The value of the contract has not been disclosed.

Council officials who work from home will get first choice of redundant desks and seats.

The Council have also admitted that nearly £1 million will be spent on new furniture at the new HQ. Expenditure includes the purchase of 2507 new seats. These are described as:
• 1,160 task chairs (for sitting at desks)
• 793 for Customer Centre and Meeting Rooms
• 153 Cafe
• 401 soft seating including sofas (sofas counted as one seat regardless of size)

Although the building will be home to 1400 staff fewer than 1000 are expected to be in the building at any one time. “Hot desking” (using any free desk) will be standard practice for all staff.

No formal opening date for the HQ has been announced but taxpayers will be hoping that costs will be kept to a minimum. Rumours of a “Royal” opening have been discounted.

Saturday frequency bus services are operating in York and North Yorkshire today and tomorrow.

There are some exceptions; see http://getdown.org.uk/bus/xmas.shtml

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Jga12Im8cvk

http://netanimations.net/So-This-Is-Christmas.mp3

North Yorkshire Police have launched a recruitment campaign for Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs).

The force is looking for community-minded people who want to improve the quality of life in their neighbourhoods.

Posts are available in locations across the force area and we are particularly interested in hearing from candidates with a desire to work in the Scarborough, Filey and Whitby areas.

North Yorkshire Police has 179 PCSOs currently; this new recruitment campaign is designed to increase this to the full complement of 183 as well as maintain numbers as PCSOs progress their careers or leave the force; in Scarborough there will be a small increase in the number of PCSOs.

For more information about the role of a PCSO and the recruitment and training process, please go to the North Yorkshire Police website www.northyorkshire.police.uk/pcso or call (01609) 789642.

The closing date for applications is Monday 31 December 2012 at 4pm.

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City of York Council have issued a statement saying “there will be no household waste, recycling or green bin collections during the week commencing 24 December”.

“There will also be no waste collections on Tuesday 1 January 2013. Residents expecting a collection on this day will have their waste collected on another day that week.

The council will make every effort to collect waste on the scheduled day but, due to the amount of waste generated at this time of the year, some delays to the schedule may occur. Residents are asked to make full use of the Kerbside recycling service, local recycling banks or the recycling facilities at the household waste sites to prevent unnecessary waste going to landfill.

To prevent a build up of waste, all households will receive an extra collection either the week commencing 17 December or the week commencing 31 December.

Wrapping paper and greetings cards can be recycled in recycling boxes or shared recycling bins and real Christmas trees can be recycled in the green bins as long as it fits inside the bin with the lid closed

Residents are advised to refer to their collection calendars, which were delivered to all households recently, to find out what their collection arrangements are this Christmas”.

Household Waste Recycling Centres will be closed Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Years Day. The sites will be open as usual on all other days for residents to bring their excess festive waste for recycling.

For more information on waste and recycling visit: www.york.gov.uk/environment/waste/ or follow @CityofYork on Twitter

The restricted collections are due to the Council cutting back on overtime payments. We think that the Council is wrong to cancel the New Years Day collections. Anyone with a grumble should ring Cllr David Levene (01904 270068) who is responsible for the decision.

With the New Year almost here, City of York Council’s ‘Learning for Everyone’ adult learning programme is now available with new and improved courses for 2013.
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It seems likely that there will be minor flooding in parts of York over the next 48 hours. However the threat is not as great as seen earlier in the year.

Roads like Skeldergate will be closed.

The shopping centres will be unaffected although the will be pressure on parking spaces in the run up to Christmas. There is a flood warning in place for St Georges field. Use of the Park and Ride service is recommended.

As always the best guide is the web cam on Kings Staith www.farsondigitalwatercams.com/live-webcams/north/Ouse/York/#. If the no entry sign is still above the waterline then there should not be any serious flooding.

We’ll provide updates if things deteriorate

The Environment Agencies web site also now has an improved graphical representation of flood threats (above) It can be accessed here: http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/homeandleisure/floods/142151.aspx

You can check the position at monitoring sites across the County here for the Ouse catchment area tinyurl.com/Ouse-catchment

You can register to receive flood warnings from the Environment Agency here fwd.environment-agency.gov.uk/app/olr/home

These are the direct links to the Environment Agencies water level monitoring stations for York. They give the current river levels and compare them to historical records. today.

tinyurl.com/Holgate-beck-level

tinyurl.com/York-City-centre-river-level

tinyurl.com/Foss-Barrier-river-level

tinyurl.com/New-Earswick-river-level

tinyurl.com/Skelton-river-levels

Residents in west York are being urged to leave external Christmas lights on as concerns grow that Santa will be unable to find certain streets on Monday night.

A Council official has written to claim that the lighting on the Otterwood Lane – Huntsman’s Walk alley is working correctly “and is an improvement over the old lighting system”.

In reality, the snicket is in total darkness as the lighting unit points towards Huntsmans Walk leaving the pedestrian link unlit.

Front Street still has patches of gloom but it is Burgess Walk that gets the highest rating on the “dim-ometer”. The Council are now saying that they are waiting for the electricity company to connect up a lamppost. It has been unlit for months.

The Council deny having felled the street lamp on Spurr Court. Who did remains a mystery (but it has gone). The Council say they are “looking into it”. They had better “look” during daylight hours!

Meanwhile at the last Council meeting Cllr “Leftie” Levene, who is responsible for the shambles, assured residents that the new lights that have been installed provide better illumination than those that were replaced(!) He told Councillors that “the original lights may have appeared brighter because the light distribution was not controlled (i.e. shining upwards, sideways, backwards), while the new lights are dark skies compliant and only shine the light where required”.

It is actually over a decade since the Council started to introduce “hooded” lights which specifically avoided light pollution (the bain of astronomers). However, the new lights fail to illuminate a wide enough area around the lamppost (which is why the old lamps were designed to shine sideways!)

NB. A temporary floodlight has been fitted to illuminate the steps to Lendal Bridge. The Council says it is still waiting for a new ornate lantern to be delivered to provide a permanent replacement. The steps have been a source of danger for nearly 9 months. The Council only took action when a serious complaint about safety was registered together with a threat that failure to act would result in a referral to the Ombudsman