residential children's home to open in our street

[steppemum]

Got home last night and there is a letter through our door from a neighbour.
Apparently there is a planning application in to change the use of a house to a residential childrens' home. The letter was asking for people to put in ojections to the planning application.

I walked past the house today.
We are a quiet road, dead end, the house in question is large with big garden and another house built at the end of the garden (they built it and sold it off) It is close to neighbours but detached. Has its own large drive for parking. The application is for both the main house and the house in the garden to together become a childrens home.

I can't see what the problem is! I am tempted to put in a comment to the planners to say this is a nice quiet, safe road for a kids home.
I am glad that there will be more facilities as our council has a great deal of trouble finding enough foster homes.
We are detached but very close to neighbours, and we never hear a thing.

Am I being naive?
Is there any reason why this house might cause problems?
Honestly I just think this is NIMBY ism. But is that me being naive?

We had this in an area we lived a couple of years ago. A small 4 bed detached house in a tiny quiet street was purchased by a company to be turned into a childrens home. Loads of people objected and it went to appeal and got turned down there as well. The main reasons were based on a similar home in the town which had caused a lot of problems in the local area.

Reasons included police and ambulances often being called to the address at all hours and disrupting the enjoyment of the area. Staff cars being parked in the street all day and night, including deliveries etc. Possibility of relatives turning up and causing disruption etc. Not enough in the local area to keep kids entertained (it was a very boring residential areas).

What was weird was that work on the house was started before planning permission was granted.

There was definitely a lot of NIMBYism, but when you looked into similar cases it became evident that the area was 100% not suitable at all.

Good on you for being more compassionate. Most of these kids probably feel pushed out and rejected already, alienating them further does nothing to help.

@6strings1song
Just out of interest, what areas are suitable for this sort of housing if yours isn't?

This isn’t a half way house that will be filled with perverts and rapists nor will it be a nursery filled with screaming young toddlers running around all day.

As long as there is plenty of room for staff parking I see no issue.

We were all children once and we all deserved a safe place to call home.

“Children’s home” is quite a vague term and doesn’t really convey the likely profile of the residents. Group facilities aren’t generally used for younger children, who are easier to find foster placements for. If it’s a residential facility used to house some of the LA’s more problematic young people with challenging behaviour, a history of offending, ties to gangs and county lines etc, then concerns are ultimately different to a facility for housing children with disabilities, and I don’t think it’s entirely unreasonable for local residents to have concerns, especially if they have adolescent children of their own.

I think you’re a little naive though it does depend upon the type of home.

A friend lives close to one in NZ and there’s constantly trouble. Cars being stolen, their property being damaged and stolen, fights, police and ambulance attending incidents or runaways. Gang fights, creepy boyfriends showing up to pick up young teenage girls. She’s found drugs and weapons thrown into her garden.

Good for you OP I would feel the same way

You sound like a lovely person

Look up the provider - who is to manage that home? They'll have a CQC rating/report and you can see what sort of places they normally run and how well they do it.

There's been a lot of press about unscrupulous home managers coining in £000s and exploiting vulnerable young people, it's a major scandal that just slides right under the radar. Having been in a home myself albeit over 40 years ago, I feel sick reading about how these young people are treated. We farm out our vulnerable to vultures.

Presumably the letter outlined reasons for you to object? What were they?

Main issue will be whether there is plenty of parking for staff. Children's homes have quite high staffing levels.

Honest you are being completely naive op. These are unlikely to be sweet little children whose parents have died in a tragic car accident.
They are likely to be the worst of the worst teenagers; drugs, violence, arson etc. Your house insurance will go up, as they are likely to try and break in; and your property prices will fall.
You sound like a lovely person but is this what you want?

I am far from a NIMBY, when I received a similar letter I never would have written to object. Sadly I wish I had. Right next door to me we had a private company 'caring' for 1 severely disabled young person. His disability meant he screamed all day and all night. He required 4 staff at all times, shift changes were at 6am so if we were lucky enough to sleep they'd wake us up. The poor kid was often seen totally naked at the windows, throwing his own excrement. Myself and other neighbours called the police numerous times, we had to get an app to record the noise for the council, I wrote to my local councillors and MP.

The company was run for profit, they have a 4 bedroom house and charge the council for all the bedrooms at the going rate, because this one child couldn't be housed with any others for their safety, they did not 'care' it was utter heartbreaking to hear his wails.

Eventually after many months planning permission was refused, but they stayed there until the appeal was heard. When they lost the appeal they had a few weeks grace and then the child was gone.

Neighbours and I were flabbergasted that this could happen in our quiet street and no one with any authority could stop it - it was a Daily Fail headline waiting to happen.

What kind of area is appropriate for a children's home if not a quiet safe residential area? Sounds perfect!

I’d object. There is one near me (though not on my street thankfully) and there is constant trouble, noise , police , groups of teenagers hanging around drinking and swearing / shouting at members of the public.

Depends on the provider but Sexual exploitation is sadly very very common with children in this type of care. So paedophiles waiting in cars in the road would put me off. Although I'd want better for the young people than that. The safeguarding seems to be really really poor in many of these homes :(

One moved in next door to us.

There was no problem with the teenagers living there however the staff parking was a nightmare.

The comings and goings in the middle of the night weren't good but that's because we hadn't been told (there was no permission for change of use). We thought they were drug dealing but it was kids being dropped off for emergency placements.

Done correctly, like yours seems to have been done, I would have no objections.

Agreed. There aren't enough residential homes.

Where would you like these children to go?

Well obviously near the op rather than near me.

There is one across from our old flat but by the layout of the houses that is the back/side of the purpose built building.

‘Children’s home is 7 problematic 10-15 year olds. I’d say the police are there every other day. Usually with a runaway child.

Parking - looks ample - 6 spaces for staff but they have an MDT meeting Tuesday and Friday - last one I counted 16 extra cars at it.

8 different school transports a day arrive and leave.

Neighbours by it say it definitely isn’t as easy as it sounds, kids are traumatised by being there and therefore act out to anyone who has a ‘normal’ family - very hard for neighbouring children, graffiti, minor anti social damage etc.

Ive seen the druggie drop off over the fence. Many of the parents of kids being pulled away by pol or/social work etc at the end of a visit.

It’s not as easy as people think.

Nice.

So what area would be suitable? A poor area you mean!

I used to manage one
99% of the time you'd never have known it wasn't a private family home.

They didn't go rampaging around the community! 2/3 staff at a time so no more traffic than a normal 4 or 5 bed house is likely to have.
No issues with birth parents because if there was a likelihood there would be they wouldn't have contact there.
I can't remember ever calling the police in 5 years.
One home I caught one shooting a bb gun at a neighbours shed....cue letter of apology and visit to neighbour.
We ran a tight ship.