15th January 2017

Should you decide to meander down the hill from the White Horse you will be amazed at the state of our ditches, culverts and drains.  Not for a long-time has the excess rain water flowed so freely into these. For a number of years this, and the previous Parish Council, have been trying to reverse the neglect of these hidden and forgotten features of our village.  Finally, after a large grant from ‘operation watershed’ and some determination, from first myself, and then with much greater success Cllr Wendy Brown we have stopped the water flowing down the road rather than into the drains, culverts and ditches.  We are aware of one last culvert that appears to be blocked, but despite this hickup we can already begin to see the damage and degradation to the road edge.  Clearly this time of year is not conducive to road repair but we will begin in earnest in a months time to lobby for the roadside to be repaired.

I thought my article in last month’s Village News on the boundary stones would bring about a cornucopia of information regarding the stones correct position and the location of the missing stone.  Sadly, all those in the Village with long memories were bamboozled and unaware of the boundary stones existence.  It would be interesting to locate the person who spoke with Rosemary Elliott’s on Lords Peace who remember the other stone!  Sebastian Anstruther did contact us to say he would ask the estate workers to keep an eye out for the lost stone, as well as uprighting the up turned stone.

At the last parish council meeting on the 11th January we found ourselves nice and warm in the Village Hall despite the freezing cold weather.  The warmth was in part due to the newly installed boiler, which if you recall was a joint bid from Sutton and Barlavington and Bignor parishes to the New Homes Bonus scheme.  We were successful in that joint bid and have been able to give a considerable donation to the Village Hall Committee for this new boiler and hope that will keep the Village Hall warm for many years.  We will continue to work with the Village Hall Committee to update, replace and renovate the hall for everyone’s pleasure.

Finally, this month we received the resignation of Caroline Pontin, who having been given exceptional leave has decided to step aside.  We thank Caroline for her work on the parish council.  Sadly, we also received another resignation letter from our parish clerk.  Rachel has been with us for two years and has been invaluable in that time and will be sorely missed.  Notices and emails have been sent out on the village website, and so if you are interested in either serving on the parish council or as the parish clerk then do speak with either Rachel, Cllr Andrews or myself.

John Cross