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

The Council has now published responses to questions tabled at the last Council meeting. One disappointment came when the Council Leader revealed that he currently knows of no regeneration projects that the Council could help to fund and which would assist the Acomb Front Street area.

Front Street litter

Question: “What proportion of retail and office space is currently empty in each of the City’s sub-urban wards and how does this compare to the City Centre? How much of the “Innovation & Delivery Fund” and the “Economic Infrastructure Fund” does the Cabinet Leader intend to allocate to regeneration initiatives in sub-urban employment centres such as Acomb Front Street?”

Leaders answer: “Whilst this data is not held at ward level, we know that 5.56% of retail units, and 25.26% of office units, by number, are vacant in areas outside the city centre, in comparison to 5.20% and 28.00% respectively for the city centre. I would welcome any financially justifiable ideas which contribute to economic growth from all areas of the city”.

The same meeting also turned down a request for formal Council support for the “Acomb Alive” project

York police are offering a free cycle marking service to help stop thieves getting away with expensive gifts this Christmas.

Officers from York West Safer Neighbourhood Team will be at York Racecourse for two days helping people to mark their bikes and register on the immobilise database.

Members of the public can meet the police on County Stand Road between 9am and 7pm on Saturday 22 and Sunday 23 December 2012 to have their cycles marked as part of the ongoing anti-bike theft campaign – Operation Spoke.

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Six burglary suspects have been arrested in the last 24 hours in connection with separate incidents in the Thirsk and York areas.

Two men were arrested in the early hours of this morning (20 December 2012) on suspicion of burglary in York. One man, aged 32 of no fixed address. and another aged 25 from York, were arrested shortly after a burglary was reported by a householder in Wellington Street at around 3am this morning (20 December 2012).

Officers were deployed to the scene of the burglary minutes after it was reported and dog handlers conducted a search of the area. They located the two suspects and a number of discarded items in the street, including a laptop and personal items. It is believed some of the items were stolen during another burglary which had not yet been reported to the police.

Both men remain in police custody for questioning.

In a separate incident in York, officers stopped a white transit van on Ostman Road just after 12am (20 December 2012). After police officers conducted a search of the vehicle, they arrested both occupants, two 23-year-old men from York, on suspicion of theft, burglary and possessing an offensive weapon. Both men have been questioned by police officers and released on bail while enquiries continue.

But police ask residents to remain vigilant and take basic steps to protect their property.

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York’s Health and Wellbeing Board has begun a new level of consultation on the Health and Wellbeing Strategy it is developing with partners in the city.

The Board are inviting people who use health and wellbeing services, community groups and representatives, staff and partner organisations to comment on the draft Health and Wellbeing Strategy to ensure that, it reflects people’s views and suggestions and that it includes the principles and actions that are most important to improving health and wellbeing the city ofr the next three years.
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The amount that central government pays the York council to provide public services will be reduced by 1.1% for the next financial year. This is significantly lower than the national average reduction (1.7%). It compares with a 2.5% reduction in North Yorkshire and a 2.3% reduction in Leeds. http://tinyurl.com/Grant-comparisons

The reduction is offset by increased grants for education. York does well out of the revised pupil premium allocations which will help to address poverty concerns in the City.

In addition the City will benefit from additional income for the provision of additional homes (the new homes bonus)

At least 50% of any increase in Business Rates income will also be retained in the City.

The new funding system means that 70% of expenditure in City’s like York will be locally funded meaning that the Council has more control over the financial strategy of the City.

However, the present Labour Council has been heavily criticised for prioritising “vanity” projects like the proposed “arts barge” while substantially increasing the amount that the local authority is borrowing.

It is the repayment on this additional debt that could prove to be a millstone around the necks of successive generations living in the City.
The government has also announced that funding will be available for the next two years to freeze Council Tax levels. The Council in York spurned a similar offer last February introducing a 2.9% Council Tax increase. It remains to be seen whether the prospect of funding for 2 years will prompt a different reaction. If not residents face a 2% increase in Council Tax in April 2013 and a further hike a year later.

The Council have also turned down government grant payments which would have seen any reduction in Council Tax benefit entitlement, for the less well off, limited to 8%.

http://tinyurl.com/York-grant
http://www.local.odpm.gov.uk/finance/1314/plainenglishguide.pdf

Liberal Democrats in the Coalition Government have given schools in York a £3.6 million Christmas present.

The cash is the Pupil Premium funding, which targets extra money to schools depending on the number of children from disadvantaged backgrounds they have.

Local schools to benefit include:

• Dringhouses Primary School £36,000

• York High School £271,800 (the largest allocation in the City)

The Pupil Premium covers any primary or secondary school pupil that has been registered for Free School Meals in the past six years. For 2013/14, the Premium will be worth £1.65bn, or £900 per pupil, in total.

The Pupil Premium is a major Liberal Democrat priority that is being delivered by the Coalition Government. The Pupil Premium was one of four policy priorities that the Liberal Democrats put on the front page of their 2010 General Election manifesto. The others were: raising the point at which you start paying Income Tax to £10,000 to give people on low and middle incomes a £700 tax cut; creating jobs by making Britain greener; and measures to clean up politics. The Pupil Premium was one of the key measures argued for by Liberal Democrats during the Coalition negotiations. By 2015, it will be worth a total of £2.5bn a year to schools in England.

Direct schools grants in the City are also being increased from £106M to £110M.

Further information can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/Pupil-premium-2013

The complete list of allocations to York schools is:
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The coalition government has acted to address the declining quality of roads and foot paths in York.

Problems have been increasing since the Labour controlled Council, announced a £2.6 million reduction in the highways maintenance budget (56%) in February 2012.

Now the City will get a boost of nearly £500,000 over the next 2 years. See http://tinyurl.com/York-highways-grant

The funding will not return investment levels to those seen when the LibDems were in control of the York Council but it should help to address the deterioration evident on some roads.

The roads that will benefit are not yet known and eyes will be turned to the Councils own resurfacing budget which may still be subject to further cuts.