This year’s Annual Parish meeting took place on Monday 22nd April at St. John’s Methodist church. Emergency services, local organisations and charities attended and provided reports of what they are providing in the Settle area. The following is a summary of the Mayor’s annual report presented at the meeting.
Settle Town Council currently has ten councillors who contribute a valuable mix of skills and knowledge. The council is also fortunate to have a great team of staff who support its work.
The full town council meets on the first Monday of the month in the Town Hall. If you have anything you wish to raise with the council, you are welcome to attend.
Our committees meet when required during the year and these are: –
- Allotments
- Administration, Finance and Staffing
- Market and Services
- Recreation and Environment
There are also sub committees and working parties: these include –
Castleberg Crag, Devolution, Christmas Lights and Climate & Biodiversity.
The town council continues to manage, repair and maintain the following assets:-
- Four play areas – Town Head, Commercial Street, Falcon Park and Bond Lane.
- The Pump Track
- Settle Community Cemetery and Garden of Rest
- War Memorial
- Millennium Gardens, The Pinfold and The Green community areas
- The cleaning contract for Whitefriars Public conveniences
- Management of the allotments sites at Dog Meadow & Cammock Lane – these include three community run plots which are managed by local organisations and provide people the opportunity to enjoy the outdoors and gardening
- Street Lighting – The town council owns 167 streetlights across Settle which are repaired by North Yorkshire Council. The council is currently in the process of applying for funding to upgrade a selection of lights to LED, helping to reduce the carbon footprint and aid the dark skies initiative.
- Room Hire – The council has a large room which is available to hire.
- The Tuesday outdoor market.
You may have noticed an artisan market held on the market recently. This is run by RSH Artisan Markets who have hired the marketplace for the second Sunday of each month from March until December.
We hope to attract some of the stallholders to our regular Tuesday market so keep an eye out for new traders!
Settle Town Council arranged another successful Christmas market, lights switch on and fireworks display which was extremely well attended and enjoyed by all who visited. The council also organised the annual Remembrance Sunday event including marshalling the road closure on the day.
Proposed ticket office closure
The council called an extraordinary meeting to hear residents’ views on the proposed closure of the railway station ticket office. It was very well attended, and the council submitted a detailed letter against the proposed closure expressing residents’ concerns.
The council arranged extensive repairs to the Bond Lane play area wall.
D-Day 80th Anniversary Celebrations
Villages, towns, cities and organisations of all sizes have been asked to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day on Thursday 6 June by lighting a beacon at 9.15pm, in celebration of the ‘light of peace’. A short service at the Parish church is planned to mark the occasion and then the lighting of the beacon will take place at the war memorial. Further details will be released in due course.
In 2022 a group of residents resurrected the twinning association with Banyuls–sur–mer in France. They enjoyed a successful visit there and returned with a painting to present to the council from the town. This year they will be hosting a return visit and requested a gift from the council to present. We asked for photographs of Settle from residents and will be presenting a framed picture to the visitors in May. The council have also requested a Flowerpot display commemorating the twinning association from the Flowerpot team so keep an eye out on the bench outside the Town Hall this summer (see pages 32-33).
Residents often share their concerns with Settle Town Council about issues that we cannot assist with as they fall under the remit of North Yorkshire Council.
The most common concerns are roads, gritting, pavements, potholes, drains, planning concerns, refuse collections and some lighting faults. These issues can be reported direct to North Yorkshire via their website: www.northyorks.gov.uk
The council has another busy year ahead. We are gifting a small piece of land to the Scouts to enable the creation of disabled access to the Drill Hall, planning the D-Day event, Remembrance Sunday and the Christmas Lights switch on event. Ongoing improvements include wall repairs, upgrading streetlights and playground improvements and maintenance.
The council currently has one vacancy for a councillor. If you would like to contribute to making Settle a better place to live and work, then please contact any councillor for a chat about what the role involves. I am happy to talk with anyone who has any local concerns or would like to find out more about what the council does. Please contact the office to arrange this. Email clerk@settletowncouncil.gov.uk or call 01729 823617.
Cllr. D Rymer
Town Mayor. Settle Town Council
REMINDER – There is a temporary closure of Castleberg Crag whilst building works are conducted for the new disabled access for the Scouts Drill Hall. DO NOT access the site during this time.
On Monday 13 May the council held its Annual Town Meeting. Cllr Debi Rymer was elected as Town Mayor and Cllr Stephen Hogg as Deputy Town Mayor.
