Category: Regular Updates

Pencaer Community Meeting, December 2022

On December 20th 2022, a community meeting was held at St Nicholas Village Hall / Neuadd-y-Pentref Tremarchog, with around 30 residents from across the Pencaer Community (which includes the St Nicholas and Llanwnda wards). The purpose of the meeting was to generate ideas so that a bid could be submitted to Pembrokeshire County Council’s Enhancing Pembrokeshire Grant, which makes funds available through the second homes tax for community initiatives.

The meeting outlined the grant criteria and process, and then attendees were invited to share thoughts on the following topics, before the meeting concluded with the prioritisation of two possible grant bids to pursue. Oh, and as it was just before Christmas, mulled wine and mince pies were served.

A midway break for mulled wine and mince pies. It was nearly Christmas after all.

What are the Community Strengths?

  • Coastal path & beaches
  • The landscape, and an area of outstanding beauty which attracts tourism
  • Footpaths and bridleways (some of which need maintenance)
  • Landmarks – French landing site, lighthouse
  • Natural world – Garn Fawr (Dark Sky site), Strumble Head and the bird observation point
  • Local history & folk tales
  • It’s on the pilgrim route and national cycle route
  • St Nicholas Village Hall
  • Events at St Nicholas Hall – Henner WI (1x month), previously writers workshops, life drawing classes, jubilee events etc
  • Facilities at the Hall – has radar keyed disability toilet, wi-fi, audio-visual facilities,well equipped kitchen
  • Churches and Chapels
  • Tregwynt Woollen Mill – provides jobs, has cafe
  • Tregwynt Ballroom – can be booked e.g. yoga, concerts
  • Pontiago Garage
  • Pwll Deri Youth Hostel
  • Farming which provides local employment
  • The people – wide cross section of personalities
  • Broadband is good in St Nicholas Village
  • The Strumble Shuttle
  • A defibrilator in St Nicholas
  • Promximity to Fishguard and Goodwick

What Could be Better?

  • Bringing the community together more often
  • Less individual isolation
  • Cost of living support
  • Concerns over access to healthcare; more first responders
  • Communication – sharing information – online (e.g. Facebook) & offline (e.g. noticeboards and a community magazine similar to Llais Rhian)
  • Pencaer website – currently has a history focus; could increase awareness & add current information
  • St Nicholas Village Hall has huge potential but needs some work and a longer term plan
  • Housing availability and local permanent population decline
  • Village traffic safety – big tractors driving through
  • No bus shelter in St Nicholas (although there is a bus stop)
  • Sewage treatment concerns
  • Infrastructure resilience, e.g. Broadband outside of St Nicholas and mobile signal
  • Environmental support

Ideas for Community Projects

  • Coastal paths – improve accessibility for people who are not so mobile e.g. add handrails at steep parts
  • Conduct a bird & insect survey – could expand into art project to broaden appeal
  • Markers at key places in the community – information boards that explain their significance; art/photo/writing
  • Communication – link up around the whole Pencaer area (residents look mainly towards Fishguard, not St Davids)
  • Revamp local noticeboards & optimise locations
  • Improve local communication e.g. website, FaceBook, Instagram
  • Would like to replicate the Llanrhian Llais Rhian community magazine
  • Needs a person to coordinate all the communication
  • Revamp Village Hall – damp treatment; repainting; install hearing loop; improve quality of heating; battery storage linked to solar panels
  • Use this opportunity to increase usage of St Nicholas Village Hall
  • More events & activities e.g. clubs, whist drives, guest speakers, musical performances, art exhibitions and clasees etc.  Need to fund/pay workshop leaders
  • Create wildlife corridors
  • Inland footpaths – many overgrown; improve access & signage
  • Nameplates to record & preserve traditional local names for places/rivers etc
  • Create a pool of community electric bikes – for local residents to use & visitors to borrow
  • Have social nights in the Hall
  • Establish community sports – with a social focus e.g. table tennis, bowls, cricket.  Currently no obvious outdoor space for this & no playgrounds/swings.  Residents go to Fishguard/Goodwick for more serious/competitive sports.
  • Community sport/exercise – plans were in place for ‘fun run’ event pre-Covid, could be revived & updated.  Group cycling outings.
  • Community energy initiatives
  • More electric car charging points
  • AIRES – community camper van locations
  • St Nicholas ‘nifty fifty’ event

Main Project Ideas to be pursued

Following the presentation of ideas, and given the timescales and potential budget available, two outline projects were agreed in principle.

St Nicholas Village Hall

Building improvement and maintenance work to St Nicholas Village Hall to help encourage further community use, maximise community engagement through increased events, and provide fresh impetus post-Covid to strengthen community cohesion and wellbeing.

Pencaer Connected Community

Explore employing a part-time community link officer tasked with building relationships across the community, developing and implementing a communications strategy, and the creation, publication and distribution of a community magazine. This will help create connection, belonging and improve wellbeing across the area. It will also be complimentary to increasing uptake of the use of St Nicholas Village Hall.

Next steps

Following the meeting, and subject to further discussion with the relevant stakeholders, the intention is to submit two bids to the Enhancing Pembrokeshire grant in January 2023. Thank you to all who attended and contributed their time, ideas, enthusiasm, bottles of mulled wine and mince pies.

Emma and Owain on mulled wine and mince pies service

Newsletter: December 2019

In this brief update on what’s been going on across our area recently I’ll touch upon:

  • Abereiddi
  • Highways (Square & Compass and Croesgoch)
  • Transport (Castlemorris)
  • The ‘Connected Community’ project
  • Waste changes
  • Broadband survey
  • Climate change working group
  • And a general round up…

Abereiddi has been an ongoing issues for some time, and the intensification of commercial activity has been something that many people have expressed a view on. My own view is that we need a long term solution, and whatever your opinion might be, some clarity has been offered following the Planning Inspectorate’s public inquiry recently. You can read the report here under the ‘Decision and Outcome‘ heading. In a nutshell, the Inspector has dismissed the appeal against enforcement, ruling in favour of Pembrokeshire Coast National Park Authority.

Turning to Highways (or roads for those not accustomed to council speak), the speed of motorists in Croesgoch and Square & Compass continues to concern many people. I’m pleased that we have some new ‘lines and signs’ in Square & Compass, following the repainting of lines and rumble-strips in Croesgoch earlier in the year. I’ve now asked the highways department to do a ‘before and after’ assessment of speeds, so that we can compare the actual data to see if they’ve made any difference. I’ll keep you posted.

New signs and road markings to remind motorists that there is a speed limit of 50 mph.

On a related subject, I’d like to thank a resident who contacted me to discuss the public transport provision for Castlemorris. This is a difficult one to manage, as there is now an improved T11 service with increased frequency, but some less frequently used routes have been cut. There is, however, an ‘on-demand’ service through Bwcabus, but it isn’t really being used. I’m planning to hold an awareness / Q&A session in early 2020, so please let me know if you’d like to attend, or just want some more information.

Thinking about our wider community, there was a great turnout for the Connected Community project meeting recently. Working alongside some very community minded people and local leaders, we’re looking at how we can connect more people and projects across our region. We’re holding another event in February, so please take a look at the notes from the meeting and get involved if you’d like to.

On a County-wide level, the recycling changes kicked in during November. The Council has had a bit of stick for the roll-out, but when you consider that this is for around 60,000 households across Pembrokeshire, on the whole it’s bedded in well, although I did have to personally deliver a number of boxes and bags for the new system and I’ve had a few teething problems to sort (pun intended). As the collections have changed, did you know that you can sign up for free text and email reminders? It’s a very handy service and you can subscribe quickly and easily, and never forget a bin day again.

Never miss a bin day again by subscribing to the free text message / email reminder service

On a related note, I’m really pleased to be a member of the Council’s Carbon Net Zero working group. In no way am I an expert in this, but I put myself forward as I’m keen to learn more and also find ways to influence behaviour change. Alongside the chair of the working group and a council officer, we held a really good debate in the council chamber recently to ask residents what their views were. It was well attended and I’m hopeful that we’ll hold more in the future. In the meantime, I’m interested in ‘expert citizen’ views, so please, get in touch if you have ideas or suggestions on how we can get to carbon net zero by 2030.

Something that I was pleased to have an early part to play in was the work with the UK government on rural broadband. In essence, Pembrokeshire County Council has secured funding to assist in the roll out of broadband in rural areas: something that is very relevant to our community. Can I please urge you to register an interest through the website here as the more people who complete this brief survey means the greater our chances of being prioritised.

If you’re interested in getting better broadband, please complete the survey here

On a final note, there’s much more that I’ve been involved in, from helping to resolve the sewerage issues in Porthgain, to representing residents in front of the Council’s Planning Committee. It really is a privilege to serve, and I couldn’t do it without people picking up the phone, or emailing, or getting in touch through my facebook page with a query. Some issues are easier to resolve than others, and some can take some patience and figuring out, and although I won’t always get it right, I will do my best to understand the issue and see how we can take it forward.

About to address the Council’s Planning Committee

Thanks for taking the time to read this brief update, and please do get in touch if there’s anything I can help with.