– Councillors approved grants of £500 to Marykirk Village Hall and £3000 to Stonehaven & District Angling Association. So far this year no groups in the North Kincardine ward (i.e. here) have applied successfully for financial help.

– We were updated on proposals to rezone the Stonehaven town primary schools as Dunnottar is under pressure. We were also told about plans to rezone the new Blairs and Riverside of Blairs development so that any primary children would go to Lairhillock and secondary pupils to Mackie in Stonehaven rather than Cults Academy. No Blairs parents attended the public meeting on 7 September.

Aberdeen City Council had decided that Cults would no longer accept these Blairs pupils, however a new secondary at Countesswells is to be built, and so officers have been asked to liaise with their city counterparts to see if the situation has changed. There is more information at https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/BlairsRezoning

– Unemployment (measured by benefit claims) in North Kincardine stood at 1.3% in March, compared to Aberdeenshire’s 1.6% which is the seventh lowest in Scotland.

– Some 97.4% of household planning applications are dealt with withing two months. However the average time to grant a building warrant is 99 days.

– It takes on average 42.4 days to re-let a council house in Kincardine and Mearns.

– Planning permission for 142 houses at Carron Den in Stonehaven was refused by eight votes to three. Stewart Milne already has consent for 109 residential units on that land, however the firm was hoping to build smaller houses due to a market shift away from larger homes. Councillors had concerns about layout, siting and design, as well as the 40% increase in house numbers.