Burntisland Community Council has been accused of failing an entire generation of children in an escalating row over the building of a primary school in the town.
The school parent council has lodged a formal complaint against members and councillor George Kay has severed ties with the community council amid accusations of bullying, arrogance and conflicts of interest.
The moves follow a meeting in the town on Friday to discuss Fife Council’s controversial planning application to build the school on Toll Park.
The community council agreed to submit an objection to the proposal, arguing the open space should be preserved.
However parents, who claim the search for an alternative site could delay the project by 18 months, have claimed members are prejudiced and have failed to reflect the views of the people they represent.
The community council has defended its stance, saying it was caught between ”two warring factions” and had acted on the best available evidence.
In a letter to Mr Kay, parent council chairwoman Andrea Stark said four community councillors are active members of Best4Burntisland, a group formed to fight the building of the school on the park.
”It is astounding to me that community councillors can belong to this group yet still have the right to vote on the response of our whole community to the planning application for our new school,” she said.
”Their interest should have been made public knowledge at the community council meeting and they should have had no further part in that meeting or vote.”
She added: ”As a group, the parent council fully supports the planning application and the community council has been aware of our stance for a long time.”
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”With this in mind, it is a source of great disappointment that the community councillors failed to pass a neutral verdict reflecting the varied interests of the community they claim to represent, and voted instead to object to the planning application on purely personal grounds.”
Mrs Stark accused the community council of fabricating their objections to support their personal view.
”The behaviour of several, though not all, members of Burntisland Community Council indicates they do not take their duties seriously and are interested only in meeting their own personal aims. They have failed to respect the members of the community they serve,” she claimed.
Mr Kay said prejudice had won the vote, adding: ”As far as I am concerned the community council has forfeited any legitimacy to speak for the people of Burntisland and as such I see no point in continuing to have dialogue with that council.
”I would hope to resume my years of work with the community council after it re-establishes itself as an organisation capable of representing the views of our community.”
Community council chairman Alex MacDonald conceded some members were also members of Best4Burntisland, but added: ”The key strengths of a community council is we have members who are also associated with other organisations and we can’t escape that.
”The two organisations are completely different and each will present its own point of view.”
Mr MacDonald said: ”Much as we support the desire for a new school, the only impartial evidence to date was that gathered at our public meeting in October, which was overwhelmingly opposed to the proposed site, even having listened to some passionate speeches in favour.
”The current planning application provides no information which would reasonably cause us to overturn that view.”
The community council’s objection to the planning application hinges on three key arguments: the proposal tries to shoe-horn the development into an inappropriate site, there are huge gaps in terms of compliance with ordinary planning essentials, and there is no compensatory benefit for the town apart from the provision of a statutory service.