2009 A Year to Remember 09/12/09
Hi,Having been in post as Chief
Executive for the National Park for over a year now, I wanted to take this
opportunity to share with you some of the highlights of that time. While there
have certainly been some challenges, there has also been the satisfaction of
knowing we are on the right track and achieving success along the way.
But the reason I love this job so much is that we’re safeguarding the
National Park for future generations to enjoy and despite all the challenges, I
believe we have made great progress this year in our three main areas of work,
namely Visitor Experience, Conservation and Rural Development.
In Visitor Experience there
were significant changes at the start of the year when we restructured our
Ranger Service to concentrate their efforts across prime visitor locations
across the National Park including East Loch Lomond.
We now have the largest single Ranger service in Scotland ensuring visitors enjoy a
quality experience in this National Park. New shift patterns saw teams out from
8am to 10pm, 7 days a week providing over 14,000 hours of patrol time. Their
work with Central Scotland Police has recently
been recognised with Operation Ironworks receiving a highly commended award at
the National Policing Awards.
Over the season Ironworks has proved a huge
success with over 350 people searched, over 11,000 cars checked, 82.5 litres of
alcohol seized, 100 fixed penalty notices issued, 466 people warned and 77
people reported. This initiative has made a real difference over one of the
busiest seasons and I’m happy to announce that we will launch a camping bylaw
consultation in the New Year that will look at further measures to manage
antisocial behaviour on the east side of Loch Lomond and enhancing the visitor
experience. I would encourage everyone with an interest to get involved and let
us know what you think.
Other measures taken to tackle antisocial behaviour included the
appointment of our National Park Police Officer and four of our Rangers becoming Special
Constables in March. With real on the ground presence, we’ve found this to be
one of the safest years in the Park’s history.
In the area of Conservation,
we have awarded grants to over 50 projects under the Natural Heritage Grant
Scheme over the past three years totalling around £565,000.
This included the successful barn owl box project around Loch
Lomond resulting in four healthy chicks. In a year which has seen
barn owl numbers fall, this was a great example of partnership in practice. One
of the personal highlights for me was the launch of our National Park
Biodiversity Action Plan. This comprehensive plan working with our key partners
will help safeguard the landscape, habitats and priority species in the Park.
Within our Rural Development
remit, we consulted on our first Local Plan this year with over 500 responses
regarding sustainable tourism developments and local housing needs. The
finalised version of the Draft Local Plan is scheduled to be put before our Board
this month. Other developments in Planning include our new e-Planning service which
was launched in April and has made tracking and viewing applications much more
accessible.
Last month we presented the
National Park Community Partnership with £35K to provide support services to
communities across the Park. The Partnership is involved in a number of
innovative projects including the National Park Apprenticeship Scheme and,
thanks to our cooperative approach, will now be able to increase their staff
numbers and continue to deliver community training workshops, services and
initiatives. Scottish Government recently announced the Community Partnership
would receive over £100K from the Climate Challenge Fund to help deliver
‘Community Futures goes Green’ which will help households and communities
across the National Park help reduce their carbon footprint.
I’m so proud to play a small
part in helping to look after this special part of Scotland. There is still much
to achieve but we couldn’t do our job without the ongoing support of our
communities and visitors and hope this continues in 2010.
I want to take this
opportunity to thank you for that support and wish you and your families a very
enjoyable festive period.
Warm regards
Fiona