THE TOP brass of Salcombe Town Council remains unchanged, as the council unanimously re-elected the town’s mayor and deputy mayor in last week’s annual town meeting.

Cllr Mike Fice begins his third year as town mayor of Salcombe, having been proposed by Cllr Andrew Biggs, seconded by Cllr David Cohen and unanimously supported by the rest of the council.

Cllr Fice then proposed Cllr Biggs to continue his role as deputy town mayor for the third year, seconded by Cllr Caroline Bricknell and unanimously agreed by the rest of the council.

The council then moved to discuss the more pressing issue of attracting new councillors to Cliff House.

Following the resignation of Cllr Angela Clacy due to personal commitments last week, Salcombe is now four councillors short of a full council.

With the notice of the resignation being published, electors in the town can force an election in the next 21 days, if at least ten people call for an election. Alternatively, if no election is called, people can join the council through co-option.

Cllr Fice, who has been town mayor since May 2014, said: ‘We’re still looking for more councillors to join the council.

‘This year is going to be quite interesting. We’ve got the lifeboat disaster centenary, and the neighbourhood plan referendum.

‘I think one of the things people don’t understand is the number of assets that the town council look after in Salcombe.

‘They tend to think ‘they’re just there to make comments on planning applications, which South Hams Council then ignore’ - well, there’s more to it than that.

‘We’re looking at what we’re going to be doing to two of the buildings we own - the old Council Hall and the old Mortuary building.

‘We have looked into potentially putting another floor in the Council Hall. And we need to do some work on the Mortuary building to weather-proof it.

‘This will be discussed at the next meeting.’

At the meeting, it was announced that a letter has been received from a prospective new councillor, and it was agreed to invite the person to the following meeting to introduce themselves.

The next meeting will be held on Wednesday, May 25 at 6.30pm in the Library at Cliff House.