A public meeting to discuss the collapse of Cove Community Wind Farm has been demanded.
The call came at a meeting of Cove and Kilcreggan Community Council last night (Tuesday) when resident Rod Snook made a series of outspoken attacks on Rosneath Peninsula West Community Development Trust.
As revealed here, the trust withdrew plans for the UK’s largest community wind farm last month, citing landowners’ unwillingness to sign lease documents – although this was disputed by the farmers concerned.
Last night community council chairman Nick Davies said: “I know there has been a lot of vitriol and a lot of hard feelings about it.
“We the community council launched the trust because we hoped to do positive things for this community, and that was the one way we could do that because we could not get funding ourselves.
“They are all volunteers and they have done their best for the community and this particular aspect has not worked out.”
But Mr Snook, who was one of the leading critics of the plans for five 92.5-metre turbines, said the trust had received £250,000 in funding for the project that they had ‘just thrown against the wall’.
He added: “The problem with the trust is that no-one knows what they are doing.”
But Mr Davies replied: “I think the trust worked very hard to consult with the community – there were public meetings and there was leafleting.
“The fact that grants were given is because they were ring-fenced around the idea of a wind farm.
“I think it is disappointing that you are besmirching the trust just because of the wind farm.”
Mr Snook’s claims that the trust had done very little apart from the wind farm were disputed by several community councillors, but he then said: “The community has a right to see things such as minutes.
“What I would like you to do is have an open meeting with the trust to explain why they withdrew the plan and what went wrong.”
He then handed a piece of paper to Mr Davies, signed by 21 residents and requesting a public meeting to be called to discuss the trust within 14 days, saying the council’s constitution required it to do this.
Mr Davies said he acknowledged the request and would contact the trust.
The model constitution for community councils in Argyll and Bute is available here.
As the Community Council is an entirely separate entity from the Trust I can only assume this was extreme showcasing to whip up public opinion in what appears to have become hostile campaign against ‘The Trust’. Accusations about the Trust have been thrown about quite a lot but who is being accused?
1. The entire membership of the Trust and anyone connected to it
2. Specific members of the Trust
3. An individual member of the Trust.
I think that this point deserves clarification, who are the accusations aimed at?
It is 14 days since the CC were asked to arrange a meeting to discuss the wind farm and nothing has happened it s regretable that they local representatives do not respect the wishes of the local population they seek to represent.
In reply to the only comment so far on this item, no accusations have been made against the Trust or any director of the Trust. All that has been asked is that the directors stand up and tell the residents of the RPWCDT area what has been going on. Up until 30 june 2012 they had spent over £250,000 promoting a wind farm that would never have received planning approval from Argyll and Bute Council.
It is high time that the members of these Community organisations stand up and account for this sorry state of affairs and thus espect the residents of the area.