Parish comes together to oppose houses on Acton Hill

Over 100 Parishioners participated in a meeting in the Parish Community Centre Friday 10 May to discuss the South Staffordshire Council’s Plan for development for 2023 to 2041. There was 100% agreement that we do not want, or need, any housing on Acton Hill, just south of Wildwood. It is not needed, it is on prime Open Countryside that forms a wildlife corridor from Cannock Chase (an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty) to the valley of the Penk and the adjacent Staffs and Worcester canal. Building the planned 81 homes may enable many more to be approved later.

There was support to set up a crowd funding site to raise funds for the Parish Council to appoint an expert planner to assist us all to fight this. Crowdfunding has been set up at the following web address. 

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/actonhillplanning

PLEASE donate ASAP.

BUT we need YOU, the residents of the Parish who will initially be affected by additional traffic, pressure of services and amenities and damage to the environment to OBJECT. We need to object, on the correct forms, before Friday 31 May 2024.

ACTIONS:

1. Access the ‘Publication Plan April 2024’ can be downloaded from https://www.sstaffs.gov.uk/planning/planning-policy/local-plan-review
   
2. Do not be put off; it is huge, but the key points for us are:

• Page 235, it is site 036c. They say it is Weeping Cross; it is Acton Hill at the boundary of Wildwood
• Page 31 detailing where this and all other planned housing developments are. Acton Hill, site 036c is the only one ‘disassociated from any village development boundary’; this is a key failure to meet their own policies.
• Page vi at the front. These are the Policies that the Plan must meet. To oppose site 036c we must show how it does not. 
  
  We will send you some ‘bite size’ guidance to assist you to complete your objections over the next few days. The Policies are detailed in Blue in the Plan e.g. Section 5.7 Pages 25 to 27 Policy DS3 Open Countryside

3. If you missed the meeting on Friday, you can access the slides below.
   
4. You need forms to submit your objections. See attached file LPR-PB2.
   

• Each of you needs Complete ONE copy of Part A
• Then complete a separate copy of Part B for EACH key Policy. You can complete as many as you like.
• In each Part B Top Right ‘Policies Map’ put 036c Page 235. This does not change.
• Top Left box ‘Paragraph’, will change for each Policy they have breached (we will guide you!). For example, put ‘Section 5.7 Pages 25 to 27.
• Top Centre box,  will also change for each Policy they have breached, for the example above, put ‘DS3 Open Countryside’
• Further down put NO against Sound, every time.
• For Legally Compliant and Duty to Cooperate, you could put NO in all cases, OR when you make your comments (more guidance later) you can decide if you think the correct answer is yes or no for each case.

5. The first line in the large comments box under item 5 might sensibly be:

‘I consider that, in respect of site 036c in the South Staffs Publication Plan it is unsound. I ask for site 036c to be deleted, in its entirety, from the Plan.

My reasons are:……………….’

6. More guidance/suggestions to follow for each of the relevant Policies, likely 3-5 of them.

REMEMBER, there is the Annual Parish Assembly on Wednesday 22nd May 2024 – 8.00pm at the Parish Community Centre. The Parish Councillors will be able to give you further updates. You will also be able to hear what else they have been doing, and plan to do, to improve our Parish. You can tell them your priorities. DO come to this meeting.

Here’s the slides from Friday night for you to review.

Kind regards,

Your Parish Council