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Post by Joe K on Sept 11, 2012 1:03:02 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Sept 23, 2012 19:54:30 GMT
Al-Ashraf all over again...
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Post by Deleted on Sept 23, 2012 20:15:58 GMT
Having read the objections from the neighbours and the Civic Trust, I'm amazed that the Muslims are allowed to have dead bodies there. If I started up a funeral parlour in my house and garden - which is one hell of a lot bigger than that site, I think - just how long would the council take to get my business closed down? As for the noise from the site at all times of the day and night - well, I'm gobsmacked. I kicked the Emmanuel Christian Church out of my hall for being noisy; they had had a noise abatement notice served on them by the city council in January 2011, but failed to abide by it. The neighbours really should have made an official complaint ages ago.
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Post by Joe K on Sept 24, 2012 10:26:54 GMT
I see some new stuff on the documents page now. Besides an unusually unequivocable rejection from the Civic Trust, I note that Chris Rose, the 'City Planning & Technical Services Officer', asks for further details about a 'Proposal to create an extension to an existing building to use as a mosque.' This document is dated '01/11/2011', long before any official references to a mosque at 14 Charles Street, and a search for an other application at that address shows nothing either. Yet the document exists, and has been added to this application. In a second, new document, Chris Rose still needs more information but the existence of the mosque now seems to be an established fact. I wonder how the applicants are going to spin this?
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Post by Deleted on Sept 24, 2012 16:03:04 GMT
If you click on 'Property History', you will find that an application (11/00587/COU) for change of use from an industrial building (class B1, Business) to a 'community centre' (class D1, non-residential institutions) was approved last year. The problem with that application, as I see it, is that class d1 includes a huge range of uses, including libraries, law courts, health centres and - wait for it - PLACES OF WORSHIP! It's the same sneaky, under-the-radar trick played by Al-Ashraf; apply for change of use, claiming that you want to open a community centre, then tell the local community to take a flying leap and instead open a school, place of worship, or anything else within that use class. Effing bastards.
Now, to get to the claimed problem of dead bodies being stored on-site: This comes within a different use class - A1, Shops. It seems odd that an undertaker would come under class A1, but that's what the government's planning portal website says on the matter. Anyway, I can't see that class D1 would cover the Muslims for using the building for the storage or cleaning of any dead body. As Mrs. Neacy has stated "we don't like the funeral wash room", it is clear that undertaking services are being carried out unlawfully at this address.
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Post by Joe K on Sept 25, 2012 9:46:48 GMT
I did see that application, just from doing a search for 14 Charles Street. Interestingly, though, the property history show two new applications, but clicking on either of them gives you,' Application number MAHKCXHMC0000/MAHKDLHMC0000 is no longer available for viewing. It may have been removed or restricted from public viewing.' They also say, 'Status: insufficient fee', and differ from the current application only in that they say, 'with use extended to include worship', instead of, 'extension to Mosque'. I guess, after consideration, they didn't want to tacitly admit that worship wasn't already allowed, since it's happening, but IMO, they still can't say, 'we want to extend the Mosque... oh, didn't we mention that?' By the way, the asbestos sheets at The Laurels are still there... www.fixmystreet.com/report/278941
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Post by Joe K on Oct 12, 2012 12:44:15 GMT
Now here's the strangest thing. Although my objection was to '12/00820/FUL: Proposal: Demolition of existing single storey flat roofed toilet block and erection of two and single storey extension to Mosque', if anyone clicks on the link in the first post, it now says, 'Change of use of building to place of worship and community centre, and construction of single and two extensions. (Revised description)'.
This is especially strange if you're right, Kay, and Class D1 would have permitted that religious use anyway. Perhaps, though, it wouldn't have permitted them to pretend that they had bothered to consult residents before starting to use it as a mosque?
I've asked Phil McLellan, in charge of the planning scrutiny committee las t I heard, if, as they title was altered on September 25th, less than 21 days ago, I can also update my objection, or write a new one?
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Post by Joe K on Oct 12, 2012 15:25:56 GMT
And life is strange, on so many levels...
I went down to the offices of Barton Tredworth Developments, where the Barton & Tredworth Neighbourhood Partnership Community Trust are now based, having sold off the building to pay the debts their mismanagement created, to ask when precisely a 'meeting in October' is taking place, at which they will explain their actions. Unfortunately, David Mitchell, who was their receptionist although I'm not quite sure what he is now, wasn't there, so it looked like I would have to try again on Monday.
However... I decided to pop around the corner to the 'mosque' to see if a new notice had been put up, since an email from Bob Ristic, the 'Senior Planning Officer' in charge of overseeing this application, suggested it would be. It was still the old notice, though, yellowing with age.
As I continued on to the corner of Charles St, by the entrance to Asda's car park, meaning to walk along Widden St and home, who should I see pushing a trolley out of the car park but BTCT chairwoman Carol Francis. I seized the opportunity to ask her when the meeting was happening. Her rather terse reply was, "When the accounts are finished". Of course, I would have thought the committee would have waited until they had an idea when that would be before announcing a meeting in October which clearly isn't going to happen now, since they will need to give residents at least two weeks notice, but that's the way they run things...
The accounts are now 195 days overdue, which is 95 more days than the Charity Commission allows them to be.
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Post by Joe K on Oct 13, 2012 18:56:31 GMT
Yesterday, I found I was able to post a new comment on the altered application, and I had an email from Bob Ristic, the Chief Planning Officer, saying that there were now a further 21 days available for comment. When I looked at the application this morning, I saw that there was now a flurry of new documents relating to the application, and at least two of them, despite the 'received date' being '17/09/12', weren't there a couple of days ago. Perhaps they were left in reserve until they were needed, especially the one that waxed lyrical about combatting extremism and promoting 'moderate Islam'.
I've posted a new comment (hope I conveyed your point about D1 use correctly, Kay):
This planning application becomes ever more confused.
Application 11/00587/COU, submitted in May of last year, already obtained D1 use, which would allow the building to be used as a 'place of worship', though Planning Officer Bob Ristic doesn't seem to be aware of this application, judging by the email he sent me. What neither that application, or this present one does, though, is permit the storage and cleaning of dead bodies, which is what Mrs Neacy has complained about.
(I note also that in my comments, text from an error message email to Bob Ristic ('However, there has been a problem...') has been included along with each comment. This isn't very professional behaviour, and on the first occasion my postal address was also displayed, although the comment form says that it won't be.)
The client claims, in a letter to the council, that this sect differs from existing (also Sunni) mosques in the area in allowing women to worship. If this is really the case, how is it that there have not been complaints about this restrictive behaviour to councillors?
There seems to have been a flurry of activity to bolster this application following my original objection, and although efforts to introduce a mosque only a short distance from an existing mosque, without any fanfare, seem to have failed, I have little doubt that the application will be approved anyway. I note that the Colwell Centre on Derby Road was the original location proposed for a Ghousia Mosque, that it once housed the Ghousia Islamic Centre, and that it is currently the location of an ersatz, and studentless, 'college', with (the same?) Muslim owners. With ample parking facilities, would this not be a better location than Charles Street?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 14, 2012 23:51:55 GMT
You meant Barton & Tredworth Community Trust...
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Post by Joe K on Oct 15, 2012 7:39:55 GMT
Hell yes, my bad... (Y'know, on non-smiley supporting sites, I use colon-hyphen-square bracket with 'Wot, no..? posts. Didn't realise it was the embarrassment smiley...)
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Post by Joe K on Oct 15, 2012 13:07:09 GMT
There are nearly two more weeks to comment on the above application, anyway, though they only seem to have extended it after my email...
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Post by Joe K on Oct 18, 2012 14:14:47 GMT
My new comment still hasn't appeared on the application website. I guess the remarks about Bob Ristic are considered infra dig, but it really is a badly run site...
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Post by Deleted on Oct 18, 2012 15:23:16 GMT
This application is really starting to tick me off. It's not that it affects me directly in any way, but the way in which a storage unit has become a mosque without proper consultation is a disgrace. Now the council is claiming that the preparation of dead bodies is an ancillary use of the mosque, so doesn't require planning permission. That should mean that, if I chose to call my hall a mosque, I would be able to use the hall for the preparation of dead bodies for burial. After all, it is in exactly the same use class - D1. 'Stupid cubed' rides again.
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Post by Joe K on Oct 18, 2012 15:51:13 GMT
And while all this is happening, the partnership remains as clueless as ever, while the CCCP would be all over a similar planning application...
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