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St Stephen Parish Council Coronation Festival – final details

We can’t wait to welcome residents to our fantastic celebration of the Coronation of King Charles III from 3pm on Saturday 6 May. Bands will be playing throughout, with a fantastic firework finale at 9:50pm.

Music:

A fantastic line up of live music acts for all the family to enjoy with our very own special compère – Elvis Shmelvis – bringing the event to the next level! 🎵🎹🎙🎸

The Big Choir start our line up

Grace George – a real young musical talent whose latest song featured on the Love Island final!

Kick Pistol – popular local teen rock and punk band

The Papersnakes – acoustic duo

The Brickets – back by popular demand, singing their toe tapping songs from the 60s and 70s

And headlining are Soul Enforcement Crew – an exciting and hugely popular 8-piece soul band!

Refreshments:

Taste buds get ready to be tingled with a fantastic variety of food and drink stalls!

Gracey’s Pizza 🍕

Raj’s Indian delights 🍛

Jack’s Smokehouse 🥩

Churro Boyz 🍩

Queen of the Island (Caribbean) 🍗

The Weeping Chef (vegan) 🥕 🍅

Lazy Llama☕ 🍰

Girl Guides (burgers and hot dogs) 🍔 🌭

The Lankan Kitchen (Sri Lankan food) 🍛

The Orange Van (drinks).🍸

Tipsy Bubbles (drinks).🍾

The Overdraught Pub 🍺

Entertainment:

On a large screen we will be showing highlights of the coronation – keeping us in the celebration vibe!

There will also be a face painter and craft activities.

In addition, we are super excited to welcome Crossfit Verulamium who will be setting up exciting and fun fitness challenges for kids and adults! Be ready!

Herts Inclusive Theatre will be on site putting on workshops for free, for all to get involved with.

Please walk, cycle, lift share, etc. as there will be very limited parking at the venue and beyond Midway Surgery car park. No cars to be left overnight or they will be clamped.

Bring your own blanket, foldaway chairs or just dance the night away! There will be no seating provided.

Please bring cash for some refreshment stalls.

Please take litter home or use the bins provided.

News from the Parish Council

Events

– We are thrilled to be running ‘A Coronation Festival’ in Greenwood Park Saturday 6 May 3-10pm.

Following on from last year’s festival we will be having live music throughout, a screen showing coronation highlights, our very wonderful Elvis Shmelvis hosting, many more food and drink stalls, children’s activities and of course our firework finale!! All welcome and this event is free ⭐️

– Armed Forces Day event is on Sunday 25 June. A wonderful event for the whole family with plenty of exciting displays and parade, held 2:30-5pm at the Parish Centre in Bricket Wood.

Green spaces

– Woodbury Field play area

The start date for phase 1 works is planned for 28 March and we are looking at a 4-week build. We would welcome feedback on this once complete and will consult on phase 2.

– Woodbury Field drainage

We have had significant issues with drainage of the site before works can start. A contractor came in and blasted the area with compressed air to a depth of 1m, which has allowed the surface water to work its way down to that depth.

When they were doing the work they hit an old fashioned clay drainage system that was still working but blocked. The grounds staff dug down and put a pipe coming off this old system and directed the water into the ditch on Lye Lane. The water came out of the pipe constantly for nearly two weeks and the site has dried up significantly. We also undertook the clearing of the ditches in the area, allowing all the water to now drain away from the site. We liaised with the different companies (Cadent, MLS Traffic, district and county council and the landowners) and did the work on the same traffic measure as the Cadent works, which saved significant costs for the council and other disruption to the general public having more road works in the area.

Well done to our grounds staff for their tenacity in solving this tricky issue!

– Tree work

All safety and general planned maintenance tree work will be completed by the end of March.

– Park Street Recreation Ground play area

We are soon going out to tender on phase 2 of the play area and hope to install after the school holidays to avoid any inconvenience.

Fixed Asset consultation

– We have appointed our independent consultancy company to review the options available to the parish council in relation to our Fixed Asset Strategic Review. Once we have held initial meetings, we hope to provide further details. Things are moving forward!

Greenwood Park

– A baby change room is now up and running in the Public Toilet opposite Lazy Llama Café. Open 8am – 5pm, 7 days a week.

We have created this with limited funds and space options but were keen to provide this much needed facility for our park visitors. We hope to include an improved family changing room option as part of future developments at Greenwood Park. New signage will be installed outside the Community Centre so it can be seen from the car park and pathway up from the playground to direct visitors.

New Community Garden

– Last week councillors voted for Grow Chiswell Green to be given a site in Greenwood Park to make a Community Garden. Our Senior Grounds Person met with Christy Mitchell last week to mark out the site. They are very excited to start their project.

We welcome residents to get involved and contact info@growchiswellgreen.org

Waste

– We are getting a lot of household waste and black bags full of dog waste put into the bins around our parks. This should all go in the brown general waste bins that SADC provide. Please can residents be more considerate with their waste!

Other news

Nominations are now open for the BBC Make a Difference Awards. Honour someone who always goes above and beyond. Entries close at 11pm on 05/03/2023. See a full list of categories here bbc.in/makeadifference

Local Elections – Thursday 4 May 2023

The information in this article has been provided by St Albans City and District Council.

From 4 May 2023, voters will need to show photo ID to vote at polling stations in the district. A wide range of photo ID will be accepted, including passports, driving licences and cards with a PASS Mark.

For more information on which forms of photo ID will be accepted, visit www.electoralcommission.org.uk/voterID or call the Electoral Commission helpline on 0800 328 0280.

If you don’t already have an accepted form of photo ID, or you’re not sure whether your photo ID still looks like you, you can apply for a free voter ID document, known as a Voter Authority Certificate. You can apply at www.gov.uk/apply-for-photo-id-voter-authority-certificate. The deadline to apply for a Voter Authority Certificate in time for the 4 May elections is 5pm Tuesday 25 April 2023.

The following elections are taking place on Thursday 4 May:

Around a third of District Council seats will be contested, with elections taking place in all wards except Colney Heath and Marshalswick West.
All seats are up for election at the following Parish and Town Councils: Colney Heath, Harpenden Rural, Harpenden Town, London Colney, Redbourn, Sandridge, St Michael, St. Stephen, and Wheathampstead. A Community Governance Review has resulted in changes to some parish ward names, areas, and councillor numbers.
Neighbourhood Plan Referendums are taking place in Wheathampstead and Redbourn.

To have your say in May, make sure that you are registered to vote, especially if you have recently changed address. A registration form is available at www.gov.uk/register-to-vote or request a paper form by calling Electoral Services on 01727 819294. The deadline to register to vote is Monday 17 April 2023.

Information about Voter ID requirements, the elections, and how to apply for a postal or proxy vote can be found at: www.stalbans.gov.uk/voting-and-elections.

Strategic Rail Freight Interchange

Following the decision of Herts County Council to sell 300 acres of land, partly in St Stephen Parish, to SEGRO for the development of a rail freight interchange, the campaign group Save St Albans: Fight the Freight has launched a petition against the sale. Details of the campaign are on this poster. The petition can be found via this link.

Sustainable Warmth Grant

Sustainable Warmth is a new Government scheme which can help pay for improvements to your home which will help you use less energy and spend less money on your energy bills. In Hertfordshire, the scheme is managed by Warmworks.

In order to qualify for funding:

Your home should have an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rated E, F or G (D-rated homes can also be considered) – this will be assessed by Warmworks

And you are a low income household. For example:

If your annual household income is under £30,000, or under £20,000 after rent or mortgage costs.
Your household is on means-tested benefits.
An allowance will also be made for the number of children in your household, or if you have recently lost income.

For more details on the Sustainable Warmth grant and to find out if you are eligible by completing a short application form, click the following link: https://surveys.est.org.uk/s/GreenHomesGrantSchemeLAD or call Warmworks free of charge on 0808 196 8255.

Cosy Community Hubs

Warm Spaces are community spaces open over winter months, offering a warm welcome and providing people struggling to heat their homes with somewhere to get warm, stay warm and enjoy a little company and some hot refreshments.

For more information and to volunteer, please contact:

Ajanta Hilton cllr.a.hilton@councillor.stalbans.gov.uk

Nuala Webb cllr.n.webb@councillor.stalbans.gov.uk

Remembrance Service 2022

Please join us on Sunday, November 13th for our Remembrance Service at St Stephen Parish Council War Memorial, Park Street St Albans. Beginning at 2.35pm with the Parade of Standards, led by the Harpenden Pipe Band, along Park Street from the railway bridge to the War Memorial. The service will start at 2.45pm following the arrival of the Parade of Standards and will be led by Rev’d Dr Nick Weir, Vicar of Holy Trinity, Frogmore. The service will close with the Parade of Standards returning along Park Street, led by the Lone Piper. The programme detailing the order of service will be available free at the memorial.

News from our Grounds staff

We have 3 new benches to place in each of the villages to commemorate Queen Elizabeth II. The bench for Park Street is already in place and we will be siting the others soon.

The Park Street village sign has been repaired and returned to the village.

We are continuing with our ongoing work to repair and maintain the 106 benches and 14 picnic tables in our care. We have started replacing worn and rotten wood with recycled plastic timber.

Hedges around the parish continue to be taken back at Greenwood Park as they are on a 3 yearly cycle.

The goal nearest the bottom car park in play area at Greenwood has been taken away to allow the grass to recover.

Please be aware we will be putting a slow-release safe fertiliser out on the areas that get the most wear at Greenwood and Park Street Recreation Ground.

The Big Platinum Festival – Oh what a night!

Thursday 2 June – a fantastic stage was set up in our beautiful Greenwood Park for a very special event – celebrating 70 years of Her Majesty the Queen’s reign.

From 5:30pm, residents from the parish came in their throngs to join the relaxed community festival atmosphere. An estimated 2,500 were in attendance!

The music from the bands covered a great variety to please all. The event was compered by Elvis Shmelvis who really brought the music together, singing his own classic songs whilst bands were setting up.

Bands on the night were Lady & The Tramp with fun singalong musical hits; The Brickets with classic 50s & 60s tunes; Starseedz with their indie guitar songs; and the night finished with The Beatroute playing party hits into the night with a full brass section. People were up and dancing throughout! A huge thanks to Elvis, his wife Sue and his team at Chiswell Studios who put on a fabulous show.

Refreshment stalls were overrun as the event got busier, with some selling out before the end. However, people were still in good spirits despite the queues as they could still hear and enjoy the music. Big thanks to Gracey’s pizza, Westman Foods, Raj Kaur, The Overdraught pub, Lazy Llama, girl guides and Tipsy Bubbles who worked flat out to serve people.

The focus of the evening moved to the national beacon lighting. Everyone gathered to watch our postmistress and a community star of 34 years, Raj Kaur, light the beacon for all to see. The amazing firework finale ensued with 7 minutes of wonder staring into the night sky to watch the brilliant display. It was a mesmerising end to a special evening.

Thank you to all who supported, helped, and attended. You all contributed to an incredibly memorable evening.

The Big Platinum Festival – final details

We can’t wait to welcome residents to our fantastic celebration of the Queen’s reign in our parish, bands will be playing throughout with beacon lighting at 9.35pm and fireworks at 9.55pm

Please walk, cycle, lift share etc as there will be very limited parking at the venue and beyond Midway Surgery car park. No cars to be left overnight or they will be clamped

👑 bring your own blanket, foldaway chairs or just dance the night away! There will be no seating provided

💰 please bring cash for some refreshment stalls

🚮 please take litter home or use bins provided

On the stage we have local bands playing a full range of music to suit all! Please give a warm welcome to:

🎵 Lady & the Tramp – a dress up duo playing favourite musical and cinematic songs

🎵 Starseedz- a singer songwriter pair playing guitar centred indie folk sounds with orchestral tones

🎵 The Brickets – local band playing 50s & 60s sounds from the platinum era of rock and roll!

🎵 Beatroute- fantastic fun 8 member band sure to get the crowd dancing with range of pop songs including a brass section

🎵 Elvis Schmelvis- a local legend in his own right. Lucky to have him compering the night and performing himself!

Our refreshment stalls are:

🍕 Gracey’s Pizza – freshly made delicious pizza

🍔 Girl Guides – BBQ of burgers and sausages (including vegan option) from locally sourced Hedges Farm

🦙 Lazy Llama – local cafe with range of savoury and sweet foods and a special royal cocktail!

🌮 Westman Foods – bringing range of Latin American and African foods to St Stephen

🍛 Indian delights – our very own Raj Kaur (postmistress) with range of vegetarian samosas and curries

🍺Overdraught- wide range of beers, wine and prosecco

🍸Tipsy Bubbles – fun alcoholic cocktails, range of Gins etc to keep you in the party mood!