Latest News from Hay Council

I haven't been going along to the Council meetings for a while, partly because I didn't have time to eat anything between the time I left work and the time the meetings started, and partly because the situation between the Town Council and the County Council didn't seem to change from one month to the next. So the following information has come from WyeLocal.

The Transfer of Assets has finally been decided - and not in Hay Town Council's favour despite long negotiations and a petition signed by 1,350 people.
So, the Town Council will continue to run the public toilets until 1st October, after which there will be, hopefully, another decision. To do this, they are having to increase the price of entry to 30p.
Meanwhile, the County Council has terminated the lease on the Council Chambers, to take effect in May 2020. This means that the Town Council will have to meet elsewhere, and the tenants of the council in the building will have to find other premises.
On a more positive note, the Town Council has received the draft lease for the Recreation Facilities, so that should be safe from closure.

The Town Council voted, at the beginning of the year, to accept that there is a Climate Emergency, and they are taking it seriously. They have a Low Carbon Group, which is working out what the Town Council can do, and they have ideas for several local projects. They are planning a community event in September.

A little while ago, I met Councillor Alan Powell taking a group of South Koreans around the Cinema Bookshop. They were from Gimhae, the first "Slow City" in South Korea. As well as seeing the bookshops, they went down to the Riverside Path to meet members of the Community Woodland Group and to see the chainsaw sculptures. They also met representatives of the Chamber of Commerce and Hay Festival.
Mayor Trudy Stedman also met the Swedish Ambassador, when they came for Hay Festival. They parked a bus at the Festival entrance.

Hay in Bloom is getting established as an annual event. Local businesses have already been judged for the competition (on Friday 26th July), but front gardens will be judged in the week of 2nd September, along with container planting around town.
The Town Council is also looking for ways to get children involved, by creating imaginative spaces in their front gardens for wildlife using recycled materials. There are ideas for attracting useful insects like bees on the Hay in Bloom Facebook page or the Hay Community Noticeboard.