TheNo.9 Winter 2009Raven The quarterly magazine for the whole of Rainow G Village News G Social Events G Parish Council News G Clubs & Societies G School & Church The Parish Council would like to wish everyone a very.... Happy and Peaceful Christmas and New Year All the Best for 2010 Civic Service Community Pride Competition The Civic Service at the end of September was a great To celebrate winning our award in the Community Pride success with many compliments being received from the Competition 2009, Cheshire Landscape Trust provided an guests. oak tree for planting at Mount Pleasant. The tree planting party included Mrs. Helen Carey (Chairman of Cheshire Landscape Trust, Vice Chairman of Cheshire Community Action and former National Chairman of the Women's Institute), Bob Price (Cheshire Landscape Trust Vice President) a representative from Cheshire Community Action and Katie Lowe (Chief Executive of Cheshire Landscape Trust). Planting took place on Tuesday 1st December at 11 a.m. with your Parish Councillors, Clerk and dogs present. Procession to the school Sir Nicholas Winterton attended along with representatives of the Parish Councils of Higher Hurdsfield and Disley and with Cheshire East Councillors Harold Davenport, Matthew Davies and Diana Thompson. The boys and girls from beavers, brownies, guides, cubs and scouts also took part together with the Rose Queen and her attendants. Steve Rathbone provided a splendid service and Over Alderley Brass Band accompanied the choir and congregation with the hymns. Tree planting at Mount Pleasant Once again a big thank you to all the villagers who helped to make this such a successful event. Councillors Signage would particularly like to thank Jo Poyser. At long last we have managed to persuade the Highways Photographs of the event will be available on our website. Authority to get the “Rainow” sign between Higher Hurdsfield and Rainow moved to the correct position close More success for Rainow in the Village of the Year to the corner of Kerridge Road and the B5437. competition In the last Raven you heard about the village’s achieve- New Boundary proposals ment in winning the Cheshire Community Pride Award We have had the consultative report from the Boundary (sponsored by Shell) and subsequent selection as Committee (part of the Electoral Commission). The draft Cheshire’s entry to the Calor Village of the Year proposal is for a redrawing of the Electoral Boundaries for competition. The judges for this competition visited Rainow East Cheshire, putting Rainow in a new single member at the beginning of October to see a very impressive ward to be known as Sutton which would include Wincle, display masterminded by the Best Kept Village team and Macclesfield Forest, Wildboarclough and Sutton. A fuller to meet people from the village involved in every aspect of explanation is on the website: village life. The effort put in by every local group was www.boundarycommittee.org.uk. The Boundary Committee remarkable and the judges went away impressed by the have asked for all representations to be made in writing by enthusiasm they met. The release of white doves as they 1st February 2010. The Parish Council would appreciate left must surely have made their visit particularly being copied in on any comments you make to them. memorable! The upshot was that Rainow won the Northern Region Award in the Communications category Notice Boards against some fierce competition and went forward to the Parish Council notice boards are for use by Rainow National Finals in that category. At the end of November, residents or others authorised by the Clerk to the Rainow however, we heard that we had not managed to clear the Parish Council. Residents are welcome to use the boards final hurdle and had to be content with the considerable but it would be appreciated if once your notice is out of success achieved in reaching a National Final. The village date you would remove it. One of the comments from the of Newton-le-Willows in North Yorkshire (not our judges in this year’s Best Kept Village competition was Lancashire neighbours) was the winner of Village of the that some boards looked rather scruffy so the Council Year and in the Communications event we were pipped at would appreciate your help in keeping the boards smart. the post by Great Bardfield in Essex. Christmas Tree Cheshire Community Action appointment Please keep a look out for our Christmas Tree this year, The council is very pleased to announce that Cllr John supplied from Cheshire East Council free. Grateful thanks arish Council News Cantrell was elected to serve as a Trustee for Cheshire to everyone who has helped with the installation and a Community Action, the body which promotes the interests of special thank you to Bill and Helen Bennett for supplying people in rural communities across the whole of Cheshire. the electricity for the lights! P 2 Be on your guard! There have been a number of burglaries in the area recently so please take even greater precautions in securing your home, outbuildings and vehicles. Many burglaries, the police say, occur Welcome to because of insecure locking of homes and vehicles. Post Boxes Unfortunately the post boxes on Hawkins Lane and at Kerridge End were damaged by fireworks around Bonfire Night (Rainow was not alone in being on the receiving end of this stupidity). The post boxes have now been replaced by the Royal Mail but if one of your letters has gone astray it was probably burnt or blown away. Blame the thoughtless vandal. BT invitation to adopt local red telephone kiosk The (Mount Pleasant) We have been invited by BT to adopt the local telephone kiosk aven “ se it or lose it”R is a familiar phrase these days. We often take at Mount Pleasant without the telephone equipment (instead of closure and removal). The Council received a number of letters Usomething for granted and never think about it until suddenly from the area expressing interest in keeping the kiosk even it’s not there any more. Post boxes for example! Until some though it will no longer have a telephone installed. Councillors idiot (probably not a Rainow resident) put fireworks in the Royal have agreed that the kiosk should be adopted for the princely Mail boxes by the Rising Sun and at the Kerridge End bus stop sum of £1 but should it become vandalised or become difficult to we never realised how handy it was to be able to walk across the look after then it will be removed. Could anyone who can help road and put a letter into the system. Royal Mail have replaced look after the kiosk on a daily basis please contact the Clerk or a the damaged boxes but the incident is a reminder to keep using member of the Council. We would like to put together a rota for local facilities. this. Also we would very much welcome any suggestions for its It’s too late, however, to make more use of the telephone kiosk at future use. BT has suggested a notice board or gallery! Mount Pleasant which we all assumed would just be there for A message to dog-walkers ever … even though we rarely used it. Now BT have decided it The Parish Council is still desperately trying to rid Rainow of the just isn’t economic to maintain the kiosk because so few calls are scourge of dog waste being left on pavements and grass verges. made from it and they are going to pass it on to the Parish It takes just one or two irresponsible owners to give everyone Council (see Council News) but without a phone in it! Removing else a bad name. Please, please pick up your dog’s waste. As a the phone in this day of mobile phones may seem logical but resident you can notify the Council of any dog walker who actually many mobile systems don’t cover the area and in case persistently allows their dog to foul without cleaning up. You do of emergency a mobile isn’t always available. But we didn’t use it not necessarily have to provide your name and address. Also and now we are losing it. there are currently two active dog wardens covering Cheshire East and they are Keith Massey and Dave Brewster who can be In the past there were several shops in Rainow and many will still contacted on 01270 529599. remember the post office/shop. But we didn’t use the shops and they too are now lost to us. When the Parish Plan was put Future Meetings together three years ago, quite a lot of us – especially young people - were keen on having some kind of shop. So far no-one 19th January 2010 16th February 2010 has come up with a plan to have one, partly because of the fear 16th March 2010 20th April 2010 that it wouldn’t be used, but it’s not impossible that some kind of retail outlet could be proposed. VIRSA – the charity which helps rural communities to re-introduce village shops – believes Rainow could support a community shop of the type which some Peak District villages have, for example. If someone were brave Your Parish Councillors enough to take the initiative and set up some kind of retail outlet, we would certainly have to make use of it. Hopefully, prospects Ken Butler (Chair) 433168 would be better than in the eighties as we now see buying locally Mary Marsh (Deputy) 573508 as “green” and rising fuel costs make it prohibitively expensive to Ian Brammer 426059 “pop down to town” for a forgotten item.