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Here’s an intriguing email sent out to all @lambeth_council Councillors from Stephanie Hudson, the Capital Fund Programme Officer around this patch:

Dear Councillors

I am very pleased to formally launch the 2010/11 Ward Purse scheme and attach the Guidance Notes and Application Form. Although the scheme is substantially the same as in previous years, the Guidance Notes have been revised to highlight some of the key areas where issues have arisen in the past and we hope that Members will find this helpful.

Good stuff. The Ward Purse scheme is essentially a #hyperlocal model for redistributing a ring fenced pot that is put aside to assist local matters. The idea is to make sure that the historical imbalance in the Rotten Borough, where Brixton draws on all the investment, isn’t allowed to run riot.

The scheme, in brief, provides £12,000 capital for each ward to be spent on up to three projects as nominated by the ward members.  This is a great opportunity for councillors to:

Promote their community leadership role and

Empower the community to deliver locally identified priorities under the Co-operative Council model.

Hang on – and so we’re trading under the #lambethcoop PR model already, Comrades?

Cripes.

The well stated intention of the ward purse is to keep it local. Localism matters. #lambethcoop may be many things to many people, but it is also untested and not yet an agreed model in which to conduct local democracy.

It now seems that the @LambethLabour PR farce is already being rolled out by apolitical council officers as a directive in how to deliver funding.

What if local communities want to be empowered to deliver locally, but not under the #lambethcoop model? Would the funding application receive different treatment?

It would seem that yet again the enthusiasm in which to walk away from all democratic accountability and responsibility is being rolled out as policy, long before the consultation is even near to completion.

My own personal idea for the Ward Purse is to apply for a £12k grant, and then spunk it on a bonkers bloke on a bike and a bucket with some fancy coloured balls. You could even call it a public consultation.

Sadly my Moultons and various fixed wheels aren’t quite suitable for Wivenhoe Wood or the banks of the River Colne. It’s back to the future in oh so many ways – MTB included.

My days of two fixies and a track bike ownership are over. It’s a London North Essex thing, baby.

A built to budget bike from yer man Bob of, um, Bob’s Bikes SE17, and then come Saturday morning and the beast was ready to roll out. It was damn hard work, with the heavy tread making heavy going of the treacle like Walworth Road. Get me on that Wivenhoe Trail ASAP.

Front suspension, disc brakes and enough rubber to power a condom factory. I can’t say it’s gonna be a ride of choice, more one of circumstances. When in Rome.

Chapeau!

I have so far kept away from #brixvill, the Thursday night pop up events taking place at Granville Arcade Brixton Village, and organised by the splendid folk of @spacemkrs. Nothing sinister – simply work commitments have clogged up the summer schedule.

But with an Evening Standard praise piece, and the clock counting down ever faster towards the Great Escape, I thought it was about time I took in the weekly highlight of Thursday Lates that has got so many locals buzzing about the bottom up regeneration of Brixton.

The basic idea is to extend the highly successful spacemakers pop up shop formula to a late night opening once a week. Since the start of the year, Brixton Village has had new life breathed into the empty units. Spacemakers has encouraged local businesses and event organisers to work alongside the more traditional traders.

With an art angle added into many of these ideas, it makes sense to open up the Arcade into the evening once a week, and to encourage diners to try out the many new restaurants. Weekly open meetings take place on a Tuesday across the road at the Dogstar. Anyone with an idea or theme for a future Thursday Late is invited to share his or her thoughts.

It all sounds incredibly altruistic, not to mention slightly idealistic -but it also works rather well. Thursday Lates has seen the coming together of old school Brixton, affluent young professionals and the Bright Yong Hipsters, all working and learning together to create something that is uniquely Brixton in outlook.

The old school Brixton boys provide the bass, the affluent young professionals pontificate over the fine food (in a picky, but appreciative manner.) The Bright Young Hipsters simply hang around and add a creative edge.

Meanwhile, @AnnaJCowen and I simply wandered up and down the diverse aisles, looking slightly out of place, but still not feeling left out. I like to think that there is some of the old school Brixton, the affluent young professionals and the Bright Young Hipsters contained within our collective coupling psyche.

The very existence of spacemakers at Brixton Village is a short-term proposition by choice. The business model (if there even is one) is directly related to the direction that the economy may, or may not take, over the coming months.

But by breathing life back into the area, spacemakers has helped to stimulate Brixton Market at a time when our friends from @lambeth_council seem intent on giving the traders a bloody kick in the teeth.

The decision to relocate the permanent temporary Streatham Ice Rink to Pope’s Road Car Park could well wipe out all of the economic goodwill that spacemakers has helped to put in place.

A public meeting to keep the temporary ice pad out of the market is being held at 7pm next Tuesday at the nearby Karibu. If any sense of the co-operation and community that can be found at Thursday Lates is present at the meeting, then Pope’s Road just may well have a future in supporting the traders, once spacemakers feel that it is time to move out.

Well, not quite closure as in no longer trading as a business (which it currently isn’t…) but closure from the point of view of a hugely successful community based campaign to keep away the proposed bonkers 5am booze and live bands licence for Kelly’s along the Clap’ham Road.

Confused?

A quick re-cap: Having closed as a traditional boozer just over two years ago, Kelly’s was bought by a local Porto businessman with grand plans. The first of Antonio da Silva’s money making schemes was to use the space to open up a clinic. This was rejected by @lambeth_council planning. The exterior neon lighting request can’t have helped.

Then came the non-licensed and illegal Porto car wash. Except that it was the most unsuccessful car wash in all of South London (tip for would be car washers: drinking booze outside your business all day ‘aint great for… business.)

The car wash was closed by @lambeth_council, but it probably wouldn’t have lasted the summer anyway, such was the lack of interest in actually washing any cars.

Da Silva then switched his attention to becoming a landlord. An ambitious planning application was submitted to @lambeth_council to squeeze nine luxury development flats (yeah, right) into the tiny space.

Building on top of the car wash garage was part of the deal, ignoring the obstacle of a grand old tree rather inconveniently blocking the building space. The application was thrown out on the grounds of over-crowding.

Running short on options, da Silva then turned back towards a bar for Kelly’s. Fine – this was the original purpose of the building, although a bonkers 5am licence didn’t exactly go down too well with the local residents.

And so on Wednesday morning, I (and many others) received official notification from the fine Ross Hill, the Licensing Officer @lambeth_council, stating:

“I write further to your recent representation in respect of the above-mentioned application, which was due to be considered by our Licensing Sub-Committee in early September.

I have just received notification from the applicant that they now wish to withdraw their application. The application will not be processed any further, and will not appear at a committee hearing.

I understand that the owners of the premises are now looking to reopen it later in the year, trading within the times permitted under the current licence, which are as follows:

Monday – Wednesday 10:00 – 00:00
Thursday 10:00 – 01:00
Friday & Saturday 10:00 – 02:00
Sunday 12:00 – 00:30″

The generous opening hours still seem to favour the landlord, and not the locals, but they are a damn site improvement on the bonkers 5am proposition. I personally probably won’t oppose the hours, although noise levels will of course need monitoring.

Lessons learnt: It is truly wonderful how the #hyperlocal community around my little patch of South London has managed to work together to overturn such a highly unsocial variation in licence application.

I started off in isolation, first seeing the statutory notices appear on the pub door, and thinking that I would be alone in trying to preserve any sense of community that is left along this corner of the Clap’ham Road.

A knock on the door with my neighbours, a blog post that hooked me up with other concerned locals, communication with the local Safer Neighbourhood Team, interest from the nearby Fentiman Resident’s Association, backing from the Bolney Meadow residents and let’s not forget the HUGE show of support from the very good @janeinlondon / E Hants and Jack the Lad Hopkins.

Here we have a local community united against a landlord chancing his luck with the Licensing Committee. Over forty objections were submitted to the Licensing Committee, as well a petition with double this number of signatures. The applicant was able to view these, a factor which led to the withdrawal of the variation in licence.

It’s such a shame that this may well be one of the final acts that I will be able to carry out around here locally as part of the community. If @AnnaJCowen and I were sticking around, then I would most definitely build upon this local network and work upon other local issues.

And so yeah – you can stick yer bonkers 5am licence somewhere else far away from our local residential community. And please keep the noise down, come the more civilised closing time.

Time gentleman, in more ways than one…

With a huge heads up to the good @labourstockwell, here’s where we find out exactly who is responsible for pitching in with the bonkers 5am alcohol and live music licence for Kelly’s along the Clap’ham Road.

The mysterious CL 21 Speed Ltd, as listed on the Variation in Licence form, didn’t give much away. Likewise for the Southwark SE5 85X postcode. For more of a pointer then you need to look slightly closer to home and the A Toca Cafe, situated along Wandsworth Road, SW8. Mr. Antonio da Silva is listed at Companies House as the current owner, strangely under the business of ‘window cleaning.’

And so it would seem that the plan is to turn Kelly’s into a Porto cafe. I’d be quite supportive of this in principle – custard cream cakes, coffees and sea fish food. I fail to see however why a licence until 5am in the morning is required to provide such a service.

It is accepted that Sunny Stockwell is home to the largest Portuguese community outside of the mother country. We are an inclusive lot around here, working, resting and playing rather well together. I would like to continue to be able to rest at a reasonable hour.

But my #hyperlocal little patch of South London is not a Porto holiday resort. It is a residential area of South London, where locals needs to rest before heading out to work the next day.

Even the Porto enclave of South Lambeth Road doesn’t have any bar with a bonkers 5am licence. My fear is that once Little Porto closes at a respectable hour, the customers will simply stream down Dorset Road and continue to party around my #hyperlocal patch.

This really should be a straightforward common sense decision for the Licensing Committee to make. If the application is to proceed (which is unlikely) then the Committee needs to assess if the lifestyle of locals living nearby will be affected.

The @lambeth_council Licensing Committee is made up of political representation across all three parties. Party politics shouldn’t come into this.

@LambethLabour courted the Porto community ahead of May 6th. It is hoped that this same feeling of respect and understanding is applied to all living within Sunny Stockwell.

It’s surprising how much detail you can actually find by doing some little digging around yourself. Having established yesterday that the planning application for nine flats for Kelly’s along Clap’ham Road had been thrown out last month, the continued on / off saga of the proposed bonkers 5am booze and live bands licence took a further twist on Tuesday afternoon.

With the Oval Safer Neighbourhood Team telling me on Saturday that the licence has now been withdrawn (hurrah!) and the good @JackHopkins_Lab saying the opposite yesterday, it was time to seek official clarification.

The truth lies somewhere in the middle – the bonkers 5am licence hasn’t been withdrawn as yet, but it is the understanding of the officers within the Licensing Department @lambeth_council that this will happen very soon.

So hurrah again.

I think.

I managed to speak with Ross Hill, a council officer working within Licensing. He recognised the confusion, as I re-told the story of how the local police believe that the licence has been withdrawn, whereas the local councillors think that it is still active.

Ross confirmed that this is all rumour, but he mentioned that the understanding within the Licensing Department is that the proposals will be formally withdrawn before they go to Committee.

The allocation of item agendas has already been filled for the next meeting on 31st August, which leaves the 8th September as the available remaining for the licence to be withdrawn ahead of the next meeting.

Ross confirmed that over forty representations against the licence have already been received. The sponsor of the licence has been able to view these, and it is believed that this evidence, along with a stern contribution from the local police, has led to a re-think.

Ah yes – about that re-think…

Kelly’s currently has a weekend licence until 2am. Although this is still rather late for a residential area, it is far more acceptable than the crazy nineteen hours of all day boozing that was planned.

I think most locals could live with a weekend only 2am licence, and then 11pm during weekdays. The conclusion from my chat with Ross however is that a new licence variation is being considered. By implication, this would suggest something slightly later than 2am is being lined up.

Not acceptable.

Ross also mentioned that the building was sold two years ago, along with the existing licence. He wasn’t able to name who the new owner is, but he said that they currently run other nightclubs along the busy commercial stretch of Wandsworth Road.

It seems our #hyperlocal little South London residential community is being confused by the owner for the night time economy patch elsewhere in the borough. Kelly’s should be a community pub, and not a nightclub for outsiders.

So yeah, it’s still very much a case of watch this space. Or even that space on the front door of Kelly’s where all formal licence variations have to be posted. If you objected to the licence then you should receive an email from the Licensing Department, *if* the original application is withdrawn.

Otherwise it looks like being Room 8 at Lambeth Town Hall on the evening of 8th September, to let the Licensing Committee know that a drinking den of a nightclub is clearly not acceptable within our residential community.

How to solve the problem that is Kelly’s along the Clap’ham Road?

*deep, deep sigh*

Consultation with the local community and cooperation to find a working solution for the site would be a good start.

Some digging around on the @lambeth_council planning database confirms that the yuppie flats application was actually rejected last month. Which makes the current bonkers 5am alcohol and live music licence for the site become all the more clearer now.

The timeline seems to suggest that the original plan was to convert the site into nine luxury flats, with a bar below. This was a separate application to the recent request that proposes to introduce nineteen hours a day of boozing into my local community.

I was broadly supportive of the flats development, as were many other locals living around here. The site has been officially empty for two summers now, crumbling around the edges and currently being squatted. It needs a long-term future.

The current owner (still trying to track down – any pointers?) now clearly wants a get rich quick scheme put in place. With the planning application refused, the timeline continued last month with the appearance of the illegal car wash.

This is no laughing matter – with no consultation with local residents, and with no contact with the council for a change of business premises, a Porto car wash appeared overnight within the garage of Kelly’s.

This was the most unsuccessful car wash in South London. It attracted zero customers. It did attract however friends of friends of friends, who all gathered outside the carwash and sat around on the street drinking beer all day.

With some help from our local councillors, the car wash was soon closed down. The handmade (and misspelled) sign still remains, as do the padlocks put in place by the Porto’s running the operation, who return periodically and dump off unknown packages.

Which brings us up to date with the Kelly’s timeline of mismanagement. No yuppie flats, no Porto car wash but a highly offensive licensing application for boozing and live music until five in the morning.

It is clear that the owner wants to make a fast buck out of the building, but not by bringing along the support of the local community on board. The consensus during our door knocking at the weekend is that locals want to find a use for the site. We would be happy for a local pub to return with a properly managed and socially responsible licence.

The complete lack of consultation with local people has given us zero confidence in Kelly’s actually being able to contribute anything to the local community. The twenty-four hour licensing laws were proposed to try an implement a relaxed continental cafe culture. What is currently planned at Kelly’s is the exact opposite of this policy. This is not a delicatessen but a drinking den.

The deadline has now passed for anyone wanting to comment on the application ahead of the meeting of the Lambeth Council Licensing Committee on 31st August. @janeinlondon / E Hants and @JackHopkins_Lab have very kindly set up an online petition to continue with the campaign.

This is a very really #hyperlocal issue, and it is genuinely a case of every extra signature gained will send out the message of mistrust that we have locally about the proposed licence.

This is a community, and not a nightclub site. Let’s keep it that way.