Hi there
How are you feeling about the recent General Election? With Labour winning a large majority, the Lib Dems gaining support and the Greens winning four seats, we’re cautiously optimistic that there will be greater political focus and action on environmental issues in the coming years.
Tim Farron has returned as MP for Westmorland & Lonsdale, and we’re writing to him and Steve Reed, Secretary of State at Defra, to ensure they understand how strongly our community feels about effective and sustained action.
Read on to hear about our successful husting event in Kendal last month, plus plenty of other news and events.
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If you’ve got something interesting to tell us, or you’d like to get more involved with our work, contact us at senstaveley@gmail.com (or come along to one of the meetings above!).
The SENS team
Upcoming events
destruction/care drop-in art workshops
Local art project guttersnipe is running drop-in workshops at the Abbey bus stop this month, ahead of its exhibition destruction/care. Read more about the project here and come along to the bus stop on Sunday 21 July (3-5pm) or Thursday 25th July (4-7pm) to take part.
Damson orchard clear-up
Wednesday 31 July
5-7pm
We’re preparing the Elf Howe damson orchard for a healthy crop later on this year by clearing away vegetation. Come and join us – please bring your own gardening gloves and wear sturdy boots or shoes. Find out more.
Danni, Staveley Woodlands Officer for Cumbria Wildlife Trust, is hosting events for young people across July, August and September. The Wild Woods offers family-friendly fun, Craggy Conservation Club is for 6-11 year-olds and Young Rangers is a taste of conservation work for 11-16 year-olds. See more here.
News
Have you seen swifts around Staveley? If you have, please get in touch with us at senstaveley@gmail.com to let us know where. We’re looking to set up a Staveley swift monitoring group next year, and we’re hoping to host a swift talk over winter with local expert, Peter Moreton. If you’re interested in being involved, watch this space.
Clean River Kent Campaign (CRKC)
Photo: Members of the public at the CRKC election hustings
We held a successful election hustings last month in Kendal, chaired by BBC broadcaster, Caz Graham. Over 100 people attended to hear from six of the eight official parliamentary candidates for Westmorland & Lonsdale. Candidates were asked about how their parties intended to reduce levels of pollution in local lakes and rivers, and about how water and wastewater services might be delivered and regulated. Thanks to all who attended, and especially to those who helped out.
Photo: The river clean-up crew by @mikebrogdenmedia
Our Great Big Green Week river clean-up
Thank you everyone who joined us for our Great Big Green Week river clean-up in June. Around 30 people braved the drizzle for the event, organised in conjunction with Lakeland Canoe Club. We welcomed walkers, kayakers and members of Kendal Mountain Rescue. It took around two hours to litter-pick along the Kent to Burneside – and ended with some well-deserved cake, of course.
Clean Water, Clean Streets June meeting
Our Clean Water, Clean Streets group aims to develop an integrated solution that will prevent sewage spilling into both Staveley’s streets and the river Kent at Staveley Wastewater Treatment Works (WwTW).
At our most recent meeting in June, we talked about how investigations are continuing, with results provided for United Utilities ‘modellers’ to look at options to improve the village sewerage infrastructure, and to increase capacity at the WwTW.
Early work is underway to stop some of the ‘clean’ ground water that’s currently leaking into the combined sewage system, and resulting in an unnecessarily large volume of water reaching the WwTW for treatment.
Some thank yous!
We’ve had some generous donations to CRKC recently. Thank you to Staveley With Ings Parish Council, Burneside Parish Council and Burneside Community Energy for each donating £500 to CRKC costs for 2024/25. And to another very generous anonymous donor!
Staveley Ebikes
Photo: The new Ebikes trailer in use
As promised, we now have a trailer for you to book with your Ebike – and it’s free to use! Just email us at hello@communityebikes.org to ask about adding it to your booking.
Support SENS
We’re a volunteer-led organisation that relies on grants and contributions. Here’s how to support our work.
Know someone who’d like to receive the SENS newsletter? Contact us at senstaveley@gmail.com
Thanks for reading!