Highways and Traffic. At the Annual meeting of the Parish Council in May 2019, villagers were canvased as to the priorities they felt should be addressed by the Parish Council in the coming year. Once again, the majority of concerns were centred on highways and traffic through the village. A Highways Working Party was formed to concentrate on these matters, led by Councillor Peter Finch and including Councillors Colin Rule and Phil Cutts. Over the past year, progress in this area has included the following:

· Strengthening of the relationship with HCC Highways Department to gain support for East Tisted projects and initiatives.

· A detailed survey of the condition of the roads and markings in and around the village, which generated requests for repairs to HCC. The majority of these defects have now been repaired and villagers have been encouraged in future to report defects as they occur through Hantsweb at https://www.hants.gov.uk/transport/roadmaintenance/roadproblems

· Following these repairs, the road through the village, Station Road, has been tarred and chipped this summer.

· A project to obtain our own Speed Indicator Device was launched to improve compliance with speed limits within the village. The sign, which can be mounted on a number of different sites within the village, flashes the speed of any vehicle approaching above the speed limit, encouraging them to observe the limit. The device also collects data on traffic volumes and speeds which can be used to support other traffic initiatives.

Village Website. Parish Councils are legally required to publish certain information, including meeting agendas and minutes on village websites. This year, the regulations covering these websites changed to include the requirement for compliance with UK security and data protection legislation (GDPR etc.) and also Accessibility Standards. As our previous website did not meet these standards, a new website was built and launched in summer 2020. You can see this at

https://www.easttisted-pc.gov.uk
Local businesses may advertise on the website at no cost and notices regarding events can be posted by emailing clerk@easttisted-pc.gov.uk

Water Supply. East Tisted experienced an unacceptable level of water outages, between 8-10 in the past year 2018/19. South East Water (SEW) hosted a drop-in session in response to complaints and explained that the main factor causing the high frequency of outages was that the East Tisted supply was a direct feed from the pumping station in Oakhanger and that any outages of the pumping station due to power supplies or water quality problems would result an interruption to the supply to East Tisted. They planned a project to install a new pumping station in Farringdon and part of this project would be to install an automatic pressure sensing valve, such that if the supply from Oakhanger were interrupted, the valve would feed water from the reservoir / water tower in Four Marks to East Tisted. This project is now due for completion by March next year and should virtually eliminate the kind of outages that East Tisted has experienced for years.

PC Meetings. From the outbreak of the pandemic, the council has been restricted in how meetings may be held. The Annual Village Meeting, due to be held in May was postponed until a time when the meeting may be held face to face. Parish Council meetings in May and August were held by Zoom and were joined by some members of the public. It is likely that the December meeting will also be held by Zoom. As we were unable to canvas villagers’ views on Parish Council priorities for this year directly at the Annual Meeting, we are requesting that any views, suggestions or requests be forwarded to the Parish Council through the Parish Clerk at clerk@easttisted-pc.gov.uk by no later than 10 December, to allow full consideration at the next Parish Council meeting on 17 December.

Parish Councillors. Details of Parish Councillors can be found on the village website – see the link above. Particular thanks must go to Councillor Helen Evison, who in addition to acting as a councillor, also fills the roles of Parish Clerk and Responsible Financial Officer, demanding roles which are paid roles in most Parish Councils, thus saving East Tisted a significant portion of our annual precept which can therefore be applied to other projects.

Phil Cutts

Councillor and Chairman

East Tisted Parish Council                                                                                                                                                       25 November 2020