Wigan Borough Environment & Heritage Network
Minutes of the meeting held on Monday 5th February 2007 at the Wigan History Shop
Present:
Joe Taylor (Billinge History/Heritage Society), Peter Guy (Gin Pit Village), Emma Scott (Community Empowerment Programme), Peter Taylor & Tom Price (Civic Trust), Philip Butler, John Hesketh & Michael Walker (Wigan Leisure & Culture Trust), Jason Kennedy (Conservation Officer), Peter Goodwin (Mirabilis Media).
Apologies:
Glenys McClellan (Leigh FHS/Wigan Registry Office), Max Finney (Over 50s Forum), Fred Holcroft (Winstanley), Barbara Rhodes (Aspull & Heigh Historical Society), John O'Neill (Wigan MBC), Ray Hutchinson (Wigan Parish Church), Tom Glover (Wigan Archaeological Society), Carol Littler (Local History Researcher) Tony Hilton (NW Catholic History Society, Friends of Wigan Boer War Memorial), Irene Nicholson (Gin Pit Village)
Glenys McClellan wrote in to express her concern about the article on the Leigh Journal about the possible centralizing of archive material in Manchester and Cheshire, which can be seen a this link http://www.leighjournal.co.uk/mostpopular.var.1165731.0.digging_deep_to_save_our_heritage.php?s=s
Barbara Rhodes had sought clarification on structure of the Wigan Borough Partnership and Heritage Network's place within that structure.
Townships/CEP approach to heritage 'visioning' report:
Emma Scott gave a detailed report on the Borough Wide Community Network meeting at Leigh 17th January. Heritage was the main agenda item and a local history quiz was used to start proceedings. A lot of information came out of the meeting and contacts were made for future reference. To list the items of heritage significance in each Township will take some time and resource. Possible funding assistance needs to be looked at. Jason Kennedy (conservation officer) will develop the criteria for Buildings of Local Importance and helping update this list will be considered as a possible project for getting the community involved in heritage matters. Civic Trust would be the obvious organisation to work in partnership with. The next BWCN meeting will be held Tyldesley 27th February.
Funding Application Proposal:
Joe Taylor and Tsenno Vattev (cultural funding officer voluntary sector) have met to discuss a funding application to enable the items of heritage significance across the entire borough to be appropriately catalogued. It was thought that a DVD component should be included and that Peter Goodwin should be approached on this matter. Peter has worked with L&CT before & Billinge History Society have equipment and production experience.
DVD component:
Peter Goodwin explained that the target group should be identified prior to DVD production. Heritage across the entire borough is a huge topic and could be the subject matter of one or for a number of separate DVDs. It was decided that L&CT should lead in the development of the funding application and that the Education Department should be included in the DVD proposition from the start. A meeting with the Education Department, Heritage Network, L&CT and Peter Goodwin will be arranged ASAP.
Building Conservation Strategy update:
Jason Kennedy updated the meeting with progress and it was suggested that the Conservation Area files could be put up on the Heritage Network Website. Jason is developing a Supplementary Planning Document regarding Buildings Of Local Importance for the Local Development Framework and will speak to John O'Neill, who had to miss this meeting due to domestic concerns, about this.
Any Other Business:
Philip Butler will draft a full-page article about Heritage Network for Past Forward. John Hesketh has reserved an interest in the next edition of Borough Life. Michael Walker will present a paper about Strengthened Partnership Arrangements within the Heritage Vision at the next Cultural Partnership meeting on February 13th. This paper will propose the establishment of a Heritage Sub-Group of the Cultural Partnership
Dates of future meetings:
Max Finney has requested an alternation in the dates of the Heritage Network
meetings, as he can't attend on Mondays. It was decided that future meetings
would be Friday 16th March, Monday 30th April, Friday 15th June, Monday 23rd
July, Friday 7th September, Monday 15th October and Friday 7th December.