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  • Agenda and minutes
  • Agenda and minutes

    Venue: Council Chamber, Sessions House, County Hall, Maidstone. View directions

    Contact: Andrew Tait  03000 416749

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    Items
    No. Item

    1.

    Minutes of the meeting on 16 November 2015 pdf icon PDF 123 KB

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    (1)       The Committee noted that there was no item on riparian ownership on the agenda (Minute 18 (9)).  It was agreed that a report on this matter would be presented to the next meeting of the Committee.

     

    (2)       The Chairman informed the Committee of correspondence relation to Minute 12/15 (Subterranean Water Infiltration in Thanet).   A local resident had disputed the accuracy of what had been stated as her property had been affected by subterranean water.  This matter was now being progressed through the appropriate Cabinet member.

     

    (3)       RESOLVED that the Minutes of the meeting held on 16 November 2015 are correctly recorded and that they be signed by the Chairman.

    2.

    Highway Flooding Events and Drainage Issues - Presentation by Katie Moreton (KCC Highways and Waste)

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    (1)       Ms Katie Moreton gave a presentation setting out an overview on service delivery and a summary of events in the financial year 2015/16.  She said that some 4,500 customer enquiries had been received during this period – a reduction from 2014/15.  Normally, the service would expect about 10,000 enquiries in a year of average rainfall.

     

    (2)       Ms Moreton said that the number of drainage emergencies had reduced to a figure of 467 in 2015/16.  She explained that these were categorised as rainfall which had led to a risk to highways or of property flooding. Such emergencies were responded to within two hours. The reason for this reduction was that the year had seen 750mm of rainfall which was about 90% of what could normally be expected.

     

    (3)       Ms Moreton went on to say that 37,500 gullies had been cyclically cleaned in 2015/16 out of a total of some 250,000 roadside drains.  A further 3,323 targeted cleansing jobs had been completed. These consisted of multiple gullies at specific sites where the public had reported that the drains were blocked.  An additional 941 investigations, repairs and improvements had been undertaken.

     

    (4)       Ms Moreton moved on to a detailed description of drainage cleansing activities. She said that all drains on main roads were cleansed on a cyclical basis every twelve months.  This programme would be completed by the end of March 2016. A service-wide programme was undertaken on high speed roads.  This meant that soft landscaping, pot hole fixing, barrier tensioning and street lighting teams would carry out their maintenance work together overnight.

     

    (5)       Ms Moreton said that drainage cleansing on minor roads was formerly undertaken on a cyclical basis. This had proved to be unpopular because the response to people who reported blockages was that repairs would only be carried out if there was an immediate threat to public safety.  This approach had been changed in April 2014.  Now, whenever an enquiry was received, it was passed to a Highways steward for inspection and an assessment, including maintenance work that might be needed in the vicinity, the work needed and the risk to safety and property.  Depending on the outcome of this assessment, the necessary work could commence within two hours at the earliest or within 90 days at the latest.  Once the cleansing was completed, the drainage system was tested to identify whether there were any inherent problems.

     

    (6)       Ms Moreton defined “Drainage Hotspots” as “a flood prone section of the highway network.”  These were areas where flooding occurred because the drains were frequently blocked. If a drainage system was seen as defective, it would not be focussed upon because repeated cleansing would not solve the problem.   Prioritisation was done twice a year by analysing all the reports of flooding and those areas where Highways had attended emergencies.  Presently, there were 114 hotspots in Kent which were attended to every six months.  This list was sense checked by the Area Drainage Engineer and the District Manager. 

     

    (7)       Ms Moreton then  ...  view the full minutes text for item 2.

    3.

    Local Flood Risk Management Strategy pdf icon PDF 103 KB

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    (1)       Mr Tant introduced his report by saying that one of the requirements placed on Lead Local Flood Authorities by the Flood and Water management Act 2010 was the production of a Local Flood Risk Management Strategy.  This would set out the objectives and actions to manage local flood risk from surface runoff, ordinary watercourses and groundwater.  Accordingly, KCC had adopted its Strategy in 2013.  This had been largely strategic in its approach and had now reached the end of its life.   The next Strategy now needed to be developed in response to the challenges identified through the current one. 

     

    (2)       Mr Tant went on to say that the current Strategy had succeeded in establishing and clarifying the role of KCC, developing understanding and joint working with its partners such as the Environment Agency and Southern Water, improving local resilience as well as providing a methodology to identify the risks and challenges.  The next Strategy’s role would be to build on the work carried out so far and focus on these challenges which were set out in paragraph 3.5 of his report.

     

    (3)       Mr Tant then spoke briefly about the first challenge “delivering local flood risk management works”. He said that a lot of work had been carried out to identify local flood risks, which were predominantly in urban areas.  It was now important to identify the works that needed to be undertaken in response, taking into account the high costs involved in comparison to their benefits.  Work to reduce risk did not necessarily involve physical maintenance.  It could also mean, for example, increasing awareness within local communities so that they could manage the risks themselves. 

     

    (4)       Mr Tant then said that although there had been a very great level of improvement in partnership working, this had not yet resulted in joint investigation of and investment in solving problems.  If this could be achieved, it would result in greater community benefits as well as the delivery of savings.

     

    (5)       Mr Bowles asked whether there was anything further that the Committee could do in order to make flood wardens aware of the great value that was placed on their work.  The Chairman replied that he intended that the next meeting of the Committee would be held in a parish and that an invitation would be given to the local flood wardens to attend.  This should not be limited to those flood wardens from the parish in which the meeting was held.

     

    (6)       Mr Bowles then asked whether the parish councils should have greater representation on the Committee. Currently, there was a single representative from KALC.  Greater representation might enable a greater focus on local concerns.

     

    (7)       Mr Bowles then moved on to the subject of combined sewer networks. In his view they should never have been allowed to be constructed. There were many thousands of these in Kent and on nearly every occasion where houses became afflicted with sewage problems, combined sewage networks were the cause. He asked whether there were  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

    4.

    Environment Agency and Met Office Alerts and Warnings and KCC Flood Response activity since the last meeting pdf icon PDF 112 KB

    Additional documents:

    Minutes:

    (1)       Mr Harwood stated that winter 2015/16 had been relatively mild with comparatively low levels of rainfall.   There had, however, been a significant surface water flood event in early January geographically focussed upon the east of the County which had particularly affected Shepway and Dover Districts.  Some 120 properties had either been flooded or required agency intervention to prevent them flooding.

     

    (2)       Mr Harwood then referred to Appendix 1 which set out those areas in which flooding to properties had occurred as well as roads and other infrastructure which had been affected by the January intense rainfall event.  He added that KCC’s partner agencies had generally been very efficient in providing the data sets required to prepare this report. 

     

    (3)       Mr Harwood continued by saying that Storm Imogen and its associated weather fronts had struck between 8 and 10 February. This event had coincided with high spring tides, leading to 11 flooding alerts and an Amber Severe Weather Alert being issued by the Met Office. 

     

    (4)       Mr Harwood drew attention to paragraph 3.2 of his report. He said that Kent had some 200 trained flood wardens. There were, however, some gaps in cover within hard-to-reach communities (especially urban conurbations and coastal areas). The Environment Agency and the Kent Resilience Team were working to address this issue together with other partners through community outreach work.  This involved some innovative approaches such as the provision of additional equipment to flood wardens and locally delivered awareness training.

     

    (5)       Further work was currently being undertaken on off-site reservoir inundation planning in Kent.  This included working with the Environment Agency to set up a specific task and finish working group. 

     

    (6)       Mr Tant informed the Committee that during the 2013/14 flooding the Alkham Bourne ephemeral watercourse overflowed heavily, causing damage to culverts. Recovery Grant funding had been allocated to replace the culverts in the watercourse along the Alkham Valley Road.  He agreed to provide this information in written form to Dr Eddy.  

     

    (7)       Mr Luke Thompson (Environment Agency) introduced himself as the Team Leader of the Flood Resilience Team covering Kent and South London. The role of his Team was to administer the Flood Warning Service and to work with partners such as KCC to encourage local communities to become more flood-resilient.  This had included the training seminar provided to flood wardens in 2015.

     

    (8)       Mr Thompson went on to set out the context to some of the statistics provided in the report. He highlighted that 2015/16 had been relatively dry in Kent and South London, particularly in comparison to the conditions faced by colleagues in the North.

     

    (9)       Mr Thompson then showed the Committee a graph demonstrating river response levels to heavy rainfall near Penshurst in the Upper Medway between 31 December 2015 and 16 January 2016. This showed river levels rising dramatically and then not falling sufficiently before the next heavy rainfall to avoid the necessity for another tidal flood warning to be issued.       A similar story could be seen in Mr Thompson’s  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.