Green belt letter to council

The text of the letter, which was handed to Welwyn Hatfield District Council (WHDC) by the North Mymms District Green Belt Society (NMDGBS) on Tuesday 17 June, 2003.

From North Mymms District Green Belt Society

To: Cllr Mandy Perkins

Dear Cllr Perkins

Welwyn Hatfield District Plan Review Public Inquiry and objections

We are a local society, representing our 1,100 fully paid-up members. Our prime objective is the preservation of the Green Belt and amenities in this parish.

As a result of the consultation on the Draft Plan in 2001, the Council has received objections relating to three areas of Green Belt land within North Mymms parish. We have also just learned of objections relating to another area of Green Belt land in the parish but we will deal with that separately.

The objections, and their reference numbers, are:

Marshmoor - D1/1010/HOU/002 and GBS/001
Skimpans - D1/1629/RES/001, HOU/002, HOU/005, RUR/003, and RUR/004
Welham Manor - D1/1619/GBS/001

Welwyn Hatfield Council has been able to identify sufficient housing sites to meet its housing requirement from within the urban areas and has therefore not needed to identify sites in the Green Belt.

We are, naturally, very protective of the Metropolitan Green Belt in general and in this area in particular. As a Society, we are strongly opposed to any proposal to take land out of the Green Belt. We have taken these actions:

Distributed 1,650 leaflets in and around Welham Green seeking support for our opposition. To date we have received 372 responses (22.5%) with all but 14 fully supporting our opposition to all three areas of land being taken out of the Green Belt. These are the immediate response from residents. We are now issuing a further Newsletter to the entire parish, not just Welham Green, to obtain wider support from the rest of the parish. The replies will be forwarded to you in July.
Held a public meeting on 19 May, which was attended by 185 local residents. At the meeting, a resolution was passed, a copy of which is enclosed.

Bob Wilson, a local resident and our President for the last 20 years, shares our concern about these proposals. He is heading our delegation to hand over to you the 372 replies to our Newsletter.

We are very supportive of the Council's intention not to take these, or any, areas of land out of the Green Belt for housing purposes. We ask the Council to pass these replies to the Planning Inspector, Michael Clark, who is conducting the current Public Inquiry. We feel it would be helpful for him to receive them on or before 24/25 June when Green Belt objections are to be heard. We shall be attending on those days.

In respect of Skimpans, we welcome additional the protection of the land by designating it as a Wildlife Site, and keeping it in the Watling Chase Community Forest.

Yours sincerely

Bob Horrocks, Hon Secretary

Enclosed - copy to be given to Mr Clark, the Planning Inspector.

17 June 2003

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