Council targets hit by flood backwash
Flooding at High Stanners. Picture: DEAN FAIL
Published Date: 09 October 2008
By ANNA SMITH
THE Morpeth flood has dealt a major blow to Council targets, knocking
several off course.
A number of 'promises' made by Castle Morpeth Council this year will
fall by the wayside as a direct result of the September 6 events, while
others may suffer as recovery operations take priority.
Councillors have admitted that pledges to reduce the amount of waste
collected, lower the level sent to landfill and increase recycling will
not be delivered due to the mountain of debris from flood-hit homes.
About 300 skip-loads of waste have been taken away and the clean-up is
far from over.
Council Leader Peter Jackson said: "We won't be able to hit the waste
targets as a direct result of the flood.
"Quite a lot of the damaged property that people have cleared out of
houses has to go straight to landfill because it has been contaminated
to such an extent.
"The waste collection tonnage has gone up quite dramatically because of
the skips in the streets of Morpeth. That is the reason we can't meet
these targets.
"It is a shame to miss out on the recycling rate of 40 percent because
we were there before the flood situation.
"It is just the flood that has caused a drop in that."
Council officers are trying to obtain waste figures before the flood to
show that progress was on track and Coun Alan Sambrook assured residents
that work is taking place to recycle as much of the damaged goods as
possible.
Another target to suffer is a promise to increase use of the Borough's
leisure centres as flood damage has closed the Riverside facility in
Morpeth.
And the level of Borough resources pledged to the new unitary council
for Northumberland could fall due to the cost of flood emergency and
recovery operations.
Plans to refurbish the Buttermarket in Morpeth Town Hall could be
delayed as the building was being used as a flood information point,
while clean-up schedules across the Borough, such as road sweeping, may
fall behind as the Morpeth recovery takes priority.
Community clean-up events are still on track, but the programme will now
be directed solely at areas affected by flooding.
And the Council is still unsure if the deluge will affect its promise to
reduce carbon emissions as there will be an increase in transport and
landfill gases from the incident, but a reduction in other areas, such
as leisure centre emissions.
"We have had a very close look at our promises to see what we can
actually deliver and what we can put our hands up to and say
realistically we can't achieve this," said Coun Jackson.
"We are going to deliver 80 to 90 percent of what we promised, but there
are a few promises that we might not be able to achieve.
The full article contains 478 words and appears in Morpeth Herald
newspaper.
- Last Updated: 09 October 2008 11:30 AM
- Source: Morpeth Herald
- Location: Morpeth