According to the adage, the devil is in the detail – and in the case of Boston Borough Council it took a devil of a lot of searching to find the details which showed that the council has again cocked up it on the spending front.

Regular readers will recall that Boston Borough Council’s habit of grasping at whatever fashionable straw is currently in the wind recently saw approval granted to acquire biomass boilers at the Princess Royal Sports Arena and the Moulder Leisure Centre.

The borough’s cunning plan was to spend £456,000 on the combined energy efficiency measures at the PRSA and the Moulder – which by some peculiar synthesis would then generate income and savings to pay for £840,000 worth of repairs and improvements at the PRSA– which would make it sexy enough to lure an outside operator to take on a lease for the place “so that the PRSA has a long-term future without on-going revenue support from the council.”

The rush for this was on – because of fears that subsidies for this form of heating wouldn’t last for ever ... which is proving to be the case.

Worst Street called in the experts –  in this case a company  called re:heat –  which has a vested interest in this sort of thing in that it not only specifies and installs the systems, but produces the woodfuel (sic) that powers them.

And according to the agenda at the time ... “the council has been supported by Reheat who has reviewed the costs and benefits associated with installing woodchip-fired boilers at both PRSA and GMLC.

“They have also reviewed heat loads, provided advice on boiler sizing and prepared detailed drawings and schematics for both sites.”

You can’t go wrong with the experts, can you?

***

But apparently you can.

After approving this ambitious project the Worst Street Munchkins ran into a slight snag – which quite literally appeared as a footnote among the reams of information put before the Corporate and Community Committee at the end of last month.

Whoops-a-daisy ... did we say that we only wanted £456,000 for the PRSA and GMLC Energy Efficiency Projects?

Silly old us.

We may have said that and turned to our partners at re:heat for advice. but the fact is that an “increase in estimates following two tendering exercises,” and “revisions” to initial plans including additional pipework connections at GMLC, plus higher costs than projected following increases to the quality specified to ensure optimum performance and increased returns on investment, call for a larger capacity biomass boiler at PRSA “to facilitate future initiatives.” and essential replacement of pumps at GMLC.”

Not to worry, though – it will all be funded from reserves.

To try to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, Worst Street has upped the estimate of the so-called “profits” from the scheme – the cost of which has now surged by 64%, from £456,000 to £749,000.

So – having approved one targeted spend we then realise not only that it is wrong, but we throw in some extra costs as well.

The Moulder also swallowed up £195,000 from reserves four years ago, in a tacky deal with third party groups who are supposed to pay back £150,000 over five years – which we presume is happening ... although it has not been mentioned since.

That was way back in 2011, following which spending on the Moulder carried on ... and on ... and on ... until it reached around £1/4  million at the point where we stopped counting – and that excluded the cost of the solar panels that were installed.

But it’s not all bad news...

Apparently spending even more on these projects increases dramatically the “profits” to be made over twenty years– from £1,700,000 in the case of the PRSA to £2 million and at Money Box Moulder from £880,000 to £1,100,000.

But just in case, there is a get-out clause which says that these returns are “assuming average LPG, and mains gas, costs return towards normal historical figures over 20 year period,”

So, as long as energy costs fall steadily over two decades (yeah, right) all will be well.

We have to stop writing now ... we hear the sound of pigs in flight...

***

Ought it not to be the case that having got the calculations so badly awry as to constitute another huge raid on the dwindling reserves, the whole silly idea should be sent back to the drawing board.

The scheme has foundered before it set sail – yet the response is merely to paper over the cracks ... this time using £50 notes instead of something floral from Sanderson.

There are so many imponderables that it should be re-assessed, the costs and benefits properly calculated, and if it proves too expensive or pointless, then it should be kicked out of touch –  before it becomes yet another Worst Street own goal.

The biomass plan was cobbled together in January – when it was described as a “no-brainer” because it would be so obviously successful.

This was ahead of the May elections and the idea was fast tracked reportedly because of the urgency to cash in on subsidies and payments before the government began any possible reviews.

Well, a “no brainer” is has certainly proved to be.

***

Whilst our “leaders” have apparently bottomless pockets as far as spending on sport is concerned, their generosity does not appear to embrace the festive season.

It fact we may well see passing of the buck rather than of the turkey in future years following  a report to the borough’s Environment and “Performance” Committee earlier in the week.

It points out that the five-year contract for a mind-boggling £35,000 a year for seasonal lights expires at the end of the year.

In total keeping with the mind-set of a council that apparently has no eye to the future, the report declared “as matters currently stand the council has no current plan or budgetary provision in place to renew that contract or to seek new arrangements for the provision of Christmas lighting in the town for Christmas 2016 and into the future” and adds that “the provision of Christmas lighting in the town is a discretionary rather than statutory function of the council.

“In towns and cities across the country, Christmas lighting, if it provided, is paid for and supplied by various means and increasingly through private sector or charitable sponsorship or by town councils and parish councils.”

But not in Lincolnshire, it appears where most market town councils consider that supporting Christmas is a good idea.

Although the thrust of the report was one of discussion, repeated mentions of the cost and absence of any statutory responsibility strongly imply that Worst Street would rather be rid of the whole thing

Questions are asked such as “should the Borough Council, at a time of increasing budgetary constraint and pressure, continue to fund and support the provision of festive Christmas lighting across the town centre?’

“If it decides to both fund and/or support delivery, ‘what level of support and involvement, through facilitation, should it be involved in?’

“In times of austerity and with online competition, centres such as Boston need to use every trick in the book to get people into town to support retailers, pubs, restaurants and other businesses. We really need new commercial sponsorship to support the cost of Christmas lights if the council is to continue to facilitate.”

Three options were tabled.

The council carries on ... it doesn’t ... or it “proceeds to explore a new lighting contract … on the basis that other town centre traders, businesses, partners, agencies, community groups contribute significantly and also possibly, through a service level agreement take over the operational management of the resultant contract.”

This final plan would cost the council no more than £5,000 a year.

It appears that the date to switch on this year’s lights coincides with Thanksgiving Day in the United States.

Arise, a new cunning plan...

“As part of the lead up to 2020 and the Mayflower 400 celebrations ... an initiative known as ‘Illuminate’, is being rolled out  ...  (with) the intention that on each Thanksgiving day leading up to 2020 an ‘Illuminate’ event involving candles/replica candles be held in the respective towns and cities.

“The fact that these thanksgiving days occur at the same time we normally begin our own Christmas lead in, presents opportunities.

“This year, following discussions with portfolio holders, we are working with ‘Transported’ and also with Pescod Square shopping centre management, to seek to host a small Illuminate event to coincide with the traditional lights switch on. If this proceeds and if successful it would be hoped that this could continue in future years, leading to 2020.”

So, if we get this right, we stop celebrating Christmas and instead celebrate American Thanksgiving Day with a couple of candles – and not necessarily real ones at that.

Brilliant.

Ideas from this meeting will be discussed by the borough’s Cabinet of Curiosities next Wednesday.

Book your seats early to avoid disappointment.

***

Confusingly, the report mentions that “private sponsorship assists with Christmas tree purchase.”

For at least ten years, the tree was donated by Finnforest, and as recently as last year was a gift from the Port of Boston – yet the phrase suggests that local goodoers are chipping in towards costs borne by Worst Street, when this has not been the case.

We also have some trouble getting some of the numbers in the report to add up – but perhaps that’s just us.

***

Unsurprisingly, options said to be under consideration have included tapping up the Boston Town Area Committee – B-Tacky –   and/or the Boston Big Local fund for support.

It should not need pointing out by now that B-Tacky’s funds come from a special charge on council taxpayers living in the town centre wards in the same way that parish councils make charges to fund their budget.

The constitution of B-Tacky is quite clear that  this income is for funding projects to benefit the specific wards covered by the committee –  and that any monies required for the benefit of the borough as a hole  (Ed: don’t you mean ‘whole?’ Reporter: ‘No’) must come from the council's general budget.

Similarly and as repeatedly promised, the Boston Big Local kitty is not there for Boston Borough Council to tap into – as it has already done and is continuing to do.

***

Worryingly, the mention of Boston Borough Council working in “partnership” with third parties is increasingly being suggested.

These have a chequered history – the kind referred to by the authors of “1066 and All That” as “A Very Bad Thing.”

Famously, Worst Street partnered with Boston BID to progress the £53,000 empty shop funding grant given to the council by the government in three phases.

Phase 1 was abandoned because of the Wrong Sort of Stickers to decorate the windows of empty shops.

Various inaccurate quotes and wrong assumptions led to the cost of the second phase – to create the former Community Rooms –  rising from £30,000 to £47,000 which saw the third phase abandoned because  there was barely any money left.

The whole fiasco was described as “a learning curve” – presumably because the money wasted was not specifically the council’s – although the taxpayers of Boston were still the people who footed the bill through income, rather than council, tax.

***

The more partnerships we have the greater are the chances of making a mistake – but with the bonus of being able to pass the buck more easily.

At present, when we think of Boston Borough Council in partnership, other notable collaborations spring easily to mind.

Think ... Burke and Hare ... Jekyll and Hyde ... Sodom and Gomorrah ... Rod Hull and Emu ... The Krays ... Bonnie and Clyde ... Laurel and Hardy ... the list is endless.

***

A reader recently heard that a meeting of the council’s leadership junta – aka the cabinet – was taking place, and tried to find out when and where it was, as there were no published details available.

It seems that the meeting had been confused with another, and what was actually taking place was a cabinet “briefing” from which the public are excluded – and at which the powers that be presumably stitch things up ahead of the real thing.

Which reminds us: when next week’s cabinet meeting comes along will the promised “Question Time” be on the agenda?

There were only five “promises” – if you can dignify them with such a description – on the Conservative manifesto at the May elections ... and this was bottom of the list.

The idea, it said, was “enabling members of the public to ask questions and hold councillors to account on the issues that matter most.”

Perhaps the promise is being fine-tuned and will emerge at a later date, as there is certainly nothing about it on the agenda.

***

We often weigh up what South Holland District Council does alongside the lacklustre performance of the Worst Street music hall – and inevitably find Boston lacking in almost every respect.

So we had no fears when we learned last week that Councillor Gary Porter, leader of SHDC, representative for Spalding St Mary's ward, and Chairman of the Local Government Association had been awarded a peerage in the Dissolution Honours.

We can only think of one set of circumstances when our own leader and the phrase “Good Lord” might appear in the same sentence –  usually when he says something daft!

***

Having said, it seems that Boston does things differently when it comes to the matter of honouring people.

Last week the Boston Goody Two Shoes News (circulation 784) informed its reader that there were “Unsung heroes down your street.”

These were people nominated by others following an appeal by Worst Street who are to be immortalised on the sides of the borough’s rubbish carts – thus becoming “sung” heroes in the process.

An example in the GTSN shows a group of faceless binmen going about their duties with the tantalising question “anyone recognise the neighbourhood?”

We hate to say this, but whilst collecting a wheelie bin from outside someone's house, pulling it to the back of a lorry where it is automatically emptied, then wheeling it (not quite) back to where the owner left it for little pay in all weathers is not the most pleasant of jobs – but it scarcely constitutes the use of the word “heroic.”

The dictionary defines the word as: “having the characteristics of a hero or heroine; admirably brave or determined” –  and offers synonyms such as “brave, courageous, valiant, valorous, intrepid, bold, daring, audacious, superhuman, Herculean, fearless, doughty, undaunted, dauntless, unafraid, plucky, indomitable, stout-hearted, lionhearted, mettlesome, venturesome, gallant, stalwart, chivalrous, noble".

Somehow, we doubt whether any of the other nominees can be thus defined.

Coming next:  “Nipper” Bedford is named as a National Treasure.

***

It looks as though there are changes afoot in Boston in the coming months – though not especially for the better.

The first comes in a planning application for the long empty 550 year-old Pescod Hall – dismantled and moved to its present site in the Pescod Shopping Centre almost 40 years ago by its owners, Oldrids.

It was last used as a sandwich bar – and the latest plans are for use as a tea room/café/bar ... opening between 8am and 11pm Monday to Saturday and 8am to 5pm on Sundays.

What a pointless and inappropriate use for such a fine building.

We have said before that a more fitting role  for such a well-placed  historic asset would be as a visitor/tourist/local craft venue to benefit from the passing trade in the shopping centre and enhance it in the process.

Sadly – and despite its long association with Boston –  Oldrids seems more keen on making money than helping the town.

With a bar on offer, and opening until 11pm six nights a week in an area that will otherwise be closed, we can see problems on the horizon.

And what a clever idea to open a cafe and tearoom next to Greggs – which has revamped its shops to make them more like a cafe/tearoom and less like a bakery.

***

More changes will be taking place along Boston’s riverside as well if plans are approved.

The Witham Tavern pub – by the Boston Marina – has proved difficult to sell as a going concern.

Now a proposal from the marina is to change its use from public house to six apartments.

We had hoped – especially with the marina now in the hands of new owners – that there might have been a chance that the pub could have been given a new lease of life.

It is one of the town’s only truly “riverside” pubs – in that it is level with the waterside – and we had thought that it would be seen as an attraction to users of the marina and developed with this in mind.

But no.

Once again the lure of profiting from Boston – rather than improving what it might offer – has proved overwhelming.

***

One of our Quadrant Development critics has been in touch with new concerns about the project and the “reserved” matters associated with it – which is everything except for the proposed new “community” stadium for Boston United, which was the clincher that got the application approved in the first place.

An application in July by Chestnut Homes was made for the first two phases of residential development with detailed plans for the first 148 new homes of the 500 that have been proposed.

Our contributor writes: “The reserved matters are still open for comments, and the council may call it in to look at it, perhaps on the 15^th September.

“Their planning meeting is scheduled for 12^th October.

“Last August when the outline was passed on this project, any reserved matters were to be determined by Mr Paul Edwards (Boston’s development control manager) and the Chairman alone – at that time Councillor Mary Wright.

“Since no doubt this arrangement will have been passed on to the new chairman, Councillor Alison Austin, I was wondering whether she should be allowed to be in that position, being a resident of Wyberton?

“She openly had nothing to do with it all, as she was Mayor then, but now is in a vulnerable position, I would have thought.

“If the Boston United stadium is never built due to lack of funding–   as seems may be the case – is it right that the housing should still carry on?

“The said 500 homes would not benefit from a Community Stadium together with all the facilities they were promised to make it an enabling application.

“Would other builders not be annoyed they were not given the same opportunity on this site?

“The town will be blighted by another roundabout on the A16 together with a pedestrian crossing, also to add to the misery of entering the town.”

***

A reader was struck by our comments last week about proposals that might see the emergency services merge their control rooms to form a single call centre based in Lincoln.

“I was interested to read your comment regarding the possibility of all services being run from Lincoln and the implications,” he said.

“While it appears our representatives are hoping that if this were to happen we might get a better service (who are they kidding?) I recall an incident only a couple of years ago regarding reporting a pothole.

“I rang the council and was told it was ‘nothing to do with them’ … it was a county matter … but they could put me through to the relevant department.  In my naivety I assumed it would be the county office at West Street – and a very pleasant young lady asked for the details.

“Where was it? – Robin Hoods Walk, I replied.

“Where’s that? – Boston.

“Do you know the postcode? – Not exactly, but it’s near the Central Park; short pause, then ‘I can’t seem to find that.’ Another pause, then ‘Is it near Tattershall Road?’

“By this time I realised she was looking at a map on a screen (and probably in Lincoln) so I asked her to trace back down Norfolk Street until she found Central Park. Success!

“Then: Where exactly is it in Robin Hoods Walk, do you know the nearest address? – “No, but it’s only a couple of yards from the junction with Norfolk Street.

“How far from the junction? – A matter of yards.

“How big is it? – Well, I haven’t managed to measure it as I didn’t have a ruler handy, but about a foot square.

“How deep is it? – Does that matter, it’s a dangerous pothole.

“Well, if it’s less than a couple of inches deep it’s not deep enough. – OK then, it’s about three inches deep.

“Oh it meets the criteria, so we can get if fixed.

“In fairness, it was fixed the next day, but just imagine how long it will take in the future if you are talking to staff who don’t know the area.

“As for the council, don’t get me started. I honestly thought after all the criticisms from residents reported by yourself and the local press that we would have a new council – and yet they still get voted in and by a little more than skulduggery manage to get control again!

“God help us for the next five years.”

***

Finally, for once we are grateful to Boston's Goody Two Shoes News (circulation 784) for taking us back to our childhood with a photo in Wednesday’s edition.

It showed Boston Mayor, Councillor Richard Austin, posing with a giant flower as part of yet another daft Transported stunt called the Boston Gateway Project.

Instantly we were transported ourselves ... back in time to Coronation year –  and the televised antics of Bill and Ben, the Flowerpot Men and their squeaky-voiced sidekick the Little Weed.

 

If you’ve not seen a photo of him before, the Mayor is in the picture on the left hand side of our montage.