To receive announcements and business brought forward by the Mayor, Leader, and Members of the Cabinet or the Chief Executive.
4.1 By the Mayor:
4.2 By the Chief Executive:
4.3 By the Group Leaders: Any apologies for absence
4.4 Council Leader and Members of the Cabinet:
Councillor Williams Leader of the Council
Councillor Harden Residents & Corporate Services
Councillor G Sutton Planning and Regeneration
Councillor Marshall Environmental, Sustainability and Regulatory Services
Councillor Elliot Finance & Resources
Councillor Mrs Griffiths Housing
Decision:
1. By the Mayor:
The Mayor welcomed Councillor Barrett
2. By the Chief Executive:
The Chief Executive welcomed Councillor Barrett and introduced him to Members.
3. By the Group Leaders:
Councillor Griffiths gave apologises on behalf of Councillor Armytage, Matthews, Williams, W Wyatt-Lowe, Bhinder, Elliot, Bateman, Madden and Timmis.
Councillor Tindall gave apologies on behalf of Councillor Ransley.
4. By the Leader and Members of the Cabinet:
(Full details are in the minutes under Announcements of the Leader and Cabinet).
Minutes:
1. By the Mayor and Chief Executive:
Mayor and the Chief Executive welcomed Councillor Barrett and introduced him to Members.
2. By the Group Leaders:
Councillor Griffiths gave apologies on behalf of Councillor Armytage, Matthews, Williams, W Wyatt-Lowe, Bhinder, Elliot, Bateman, Madden and Timmis.
Councillor Griffiths had nothing to report but was happy to take questions.
Councillor Tindall gave an apology on behalf of Councillor Ransley and asked for an update on Councillor Williams.
Councillor Griffiths confirmed that he is recuperating well and is hoping to be back in September.
3. By the Leader and Members of the Cabinet:
Councillor Williams, Leader of the Council and Portfolio Holder for Community Leadership.
There were no announcements from the
leader.
Councillor Harden, Portfolio Holder for Residents and Corporate Services
Resident Services
The Cycle Hub at Cupid Green Playing Fields will be hosting an Osbourne’s thank you event on 25th August for partners who gave their time and resources to get the works to cycle hub complete. All Councillors will receive a formal invitation.
The ASB Team has been successful in obtaining injunctions against rough sleepers who have been aggressively begging in the town centre – one person has breached the injunction and was arrested and dealt with by the court.
People & Performance
Armed Forces Day
2,000 people visited Gadebridge park on 1 July for our first Armed Forces Day celebrations where the Royal signals motorbike team the White Helmets wowed the crowds with their dramatic displays. Visitors also enjoyed activities like, safety demonstrations from the fire service, RAF Halton pipes and drum bands, fairground rides and many stalls. MP Mike Penning also presented certificates to the winning children of our military themed poetry competition.
Tring Swimming Pool Refurbishment
Kier Group (building specialists) have been commissioned to undertake detailed design work and building preparation for the £1 million refurbishment of Tring Swimming Pool. This is likely to take 2 – 3 months with work beginning shortly after.
Leisure Management Procurement
The planning for the leisure management procurement is progressing well. Consultation has been held with a number of local clubs, sports representatives, Sport England and the Herts Sport Partnership as well as all Councillors. The procurement process will begin at the end of July.
CSU
The transfer of the Customer Services Unit back into the Council is progressing well and the service is due to begin in-house from the 1st August.
ICT & Digital Transformation
Civic Centre Decommissioning
ICT decommissioning of Civic Centre complete, save for some networking equipment enabling door security.
Resident’s Portal
Resident portal development is progressing well, with initial emphasis on waste services. This will be launched in Autumn 2017.
Councillor Harden was happy to take questions.
Councillor England asked if the
portfolio holder agreed with him that Hemel’s Vitality index,
reported in the Gazette last week of the 5th July, being 391 in the
country compares unfavourably with Hemel’s position at
approximately 100 in order of town population size and what would
be our target for next year.
Councillor Harden as of yet hasn’t read the article but will have a read of it. He is proud of the investment, he will be sure to look at the context.
Councillor Tindall asked if there would be an opportunity for Councillors to comment on the Leisure Management.
Councillor Harden said that the 80 page document had not yet been finalised.
Councillor Tindall asked if Officers could consult him when they are ready to consult Councillors so he can get his colleagues to have a look at it.
Councillor Harden said that any input is beneficial.
Councillor Tindall said he is pleased to see the customer service now being done in house, he also asked if we can ensure that staff are domestic abuse trained.
Councillor Harden confirmed that 80% of the CSU staff were DBC staff and will ensure they are trained as a priority.
Councillor England asked the portfolio holder if they planned to add more electric charging points in the borough.
Councillor Harden advised that this was Councillor Elliot’s Portfolio area.
Councillor G Sutton, Portfolio Holder for Planning and Regeneration
Councillor Sutton was happy to take questions from Members.
Councillor Tindall asked the portfolio Holder for assurance that the road leading to the Water Gardens North Carpark from Combe Street to be surfaced before the Garden Party.
Councillor Sutton will check this and get back to Members.
Councillor Tindall asked for an update on the progress of Berkhamsted’s car park.
Councillor Sutton confirmed that the portfolio holder for this was Councillor Elliot.
Councillor Tindall said that the consultation was taking place in August, this is holiday season, and could this be extended to get more contributors.
Councillor Sutton confirmed that he would monitor this; usually holidays are spread over the months so it shouldn’t be an issue.
Councillor Marshall, Portfolio Holder for Environmental, Sustainability and Regulatory Services
I hope members are able to visit the Walled Garden in Gadebridge Park. The colour from the begonias is amazing, as indeed are the many displays throughout the Borough. A team of 12 from Clean Safe & Green planted by hand 67,000 bedding plants for this summer.
Signage is being put up at the Tring Memorial Garden to remember the local residents who fell in battle of Passchendaele 100 years ago.
The additional garden waste subscription service now has 591 subscribers. In addition, letters have recently been sent to about 40 households who frequently leave out excess garden waste, explaining that only one bin is collected but advertising the additional garden waste service, the House Waste Recycling Centres and composting.
10 tonnes of compost were given away free on the 14 May in 2 hours at Cupid Green – the “Compost Giveaway”
DBC, along with the other Hertfordshire local authorities, is a member of ParkHerts. ParkHerts is taking part in the national campaign starting this week called Love Parks Week 2017 – promoting parks throughout the County and the facilities each park offers.
The DBC School Recycling Audit & Improvement Project has been launched. Officers at Cupid Green are visiting each school in the Borough before the end of the school year, to improve recycling on each site, raise awareness of the issues and to encourage participation by pupils and to encourage schools to work on the Eco Schools project. Eco Schools is a schools programme supported by a number of environmental bodies and contractors and provides very good material for pupils of all ages to encourage recycling and raise awareness of environmental matters.
Councillor Marshall was happy to take questions from Members.
Councillor England congratulated DBC on their recycling and tweets #1lesspledge, and asked the portfolio holder if she would support more of the dual Rubbish/Recycling bins leading away from shops and leisure centres such as Jarman Park, so that more plastic bottles could be recycled
Councillor Marshall said that the litter bins are split for waste and recycling already and people were not consistent in putting their rubbish in the right section, therefore currently it wasn’t working very well.
Councillor Tindall put forward a question about 6 months ago regarding the Nicky line. He said he would be grateful if he could have a response.
Councillor Marshall thanked Councillor Tindall for giving notice of the question and she would get a reply out.
Councillor Elliot, Portfolio Holder for Finance and Resources
Finance:
The Annual Statement of Accounts and financial out-turn position were reviewed at Audit Committee on 28th June and are published on the Councils website. The external audit plan was presented at the same meeting, and the audit of accounts will start during August.
Over the past few months, the Finance team have been trialling payroll self-service for expense claims. This enables employees to submit electronic claims which are authorised electronically by their manager, and imported into the payroll system. The self-service has now been rolled out to all Council employees from the 1st July.
Work is underway on setting the 2018/19 budget, along with updating the Councils Medium Term Financial Strategy. The process is starting with a review of previously submitted savings proposals, and the submission of future years proposals. Once complete, these proposals will be reviewed by the Chief Officer Group, prior to submission to the Budget Review Group and Overview and Scrutiny Committees.
Revenue & Benefits:
Following work with the Innovation & Improvement team, we have introduced online forms to make it easier for residents or their landlords to tell us when they have moved into a new property and need to register for council tax.
Commercial Assets & Property Development:
We are progressing the sale of our property interest in 5.9 acres of land at Jarmans’ Park to a commercial developer. We are also continuing the garage sales programme and have marketed six sites during the year.
The project for the demolition of the Civic Centre is progressing and there has been strong interest shown in the project from the market. We are moving towards tendering the construction of the multi storey car park in Berkhamsted.
Commissioning, Procurement & Compliance:
Working with colleagues in Legal Services & Anti-Social Behaviour we have been successful in obtaining an injunction on the rough sleeper who had been sleeping in Water Gardens North car park. The injunction enabled us to move the individual from this location and stops him from setting up on Council land.
Councillor Griffith was happy to take questions on behalf of Councillor Elliot.
Councillor Griffith thanked Councillor England for his earlier questions, a note has been made and a response will be given after his holiday.
Councillor Douris made reference to the Annual Statement of Accounts which had been signed off by the External Auditors at the Audit committee. He asked to pass his appreciation on to the Officers for their hard work.
Councillor Griffiths, Portfolio Holder for Housing
Tenants & Leaseholders Services.
The formal consultation of returning the collection of weekly water charges back to the water companies will start shortly. A letter will be sent to all tenants to inform them of our intention to no longer collect a fixed water rate along with their rent from April 2018 and invite comments and views. This project is being managed by the Income Team Leader with support from Policy and Participation team. Members from relevant departments across the council have been involved in the project action plan and both water companies have carried out similar processes before and are happy to support us and our tenants through this transition.
We are working on some key strategies and procedures at the moment including the Hoarding procedure, Decant procedure and Sustainable Tenancy Strategy (to replace the vulnerable person strategy). Additionally we will shortly be carrying out the first of the 5 years flexible tenancy reviews so are reviewing the Strategic tenancy policy to ensure it supports us with these.
The transfer from Eldercare to Tunstall Healthcare limited to answer alarm calls from our sheltered tenants has gone well. We’re pleased with the progress and there has been limited disruption to our elderly and vulnerable tenants. We will continue to monitor this contract and ensure an excellent service is provided.
We have recently had an internal audit of the Income service. The outcome was excellent identifying that we collect the rent in line with our policies and procedures and run a strong and effective service. This is vital in light of future challenges from welfare benefit changes such as Universal Credit. There were 2 recommendations of which one has already been carried out and we will provide further information to the audit service of how we intend to act on the second.
Strategic Housing.
Dacorum Borough Council’s Homelessness Service has been awarded the NPSS Silver Standard. The council is only the second local authority in Hertfordshire to attain this level. Over the past year, the strategic housing team have been proactive in delivering a new homelessness strategy and working to eradicate rough sleeping through their successful ‘No Second Night Out Campaign’. Improvements have led to a reduction in the use of ‘Bed and Breakfast’ accommodation and the introduction of personalised plans, to give people seeking housing advice the support they need. The service has also focussed on raising standards in the private-rented housing sector by working more closely with landlords and tenants through the council’s ‘Help to Rent’ scheme.
Housing Development.
Able House – Practical Completion took place on 6th June and all units have been let.
Wood House – Works are progressing on site with foundations and ground work well under way.
Swing Gate Lane – Site set up has commenced and the demolition of some existing outbuildings will commence shortly.
Martindale School site – The Planning application has been submitted for this development.
Property & Place.
Fire Safety
Following the tragic fire at Grenfell House, the Property and Place team have reviewed all of the Fire Risk Assessments for the six high rise blocks and had supplementary assessments undertaken to provide further reassurance to the tenants and leaseholders in these blocks.
Additional surveys of individual flats in the six blocks have been undertaken and any remedial fire safety issue will be addressed. Leaseholders will be written to advise them of recommended actions within their properties in order to maintain good fire safety within the blocks.
Osborne - Total Asset Management.
The key performance indicators remain at a high level and the majority of day to day works are completed on time and with a good level of customer satisfaction. There have been a few areas where communication could be improved, so that tenants are advised of any changes to the timescales for the completion of works, which are being addressed at the Operations meetings.
The planned programmes of work are underway and the electrical testing programme will commence this month and any remedial works or upgrading required will be undertaken. A number of estate based projects are currently being reviewed to ensure the specification is appropriate and that where blocks are being upgraded, all external components have appropriate fire ratings.
Sun Realm - Gas Servicing and Installation
The servicing and installation contract continues to deliver consistently high levels of compliance, currently 100% with no overdue properties. The customer satisfaction with service remains high.
ProMaster
The new asset management software is being commissioned and once all of the data is migrated onto system, will improve the access to stock condition and compliance information on the housing stock.
Councillor Griffith was happy to take questions from Members.
Councillor Tindall was relieved that there was no additional concern from the letters that were distributed to the flats.
Councillor Griffiths thanked Councillor Tindall and would pass that information onto the Officers.
Councillor Hicks referred to the water rates, and asked if the information on the transfer and single occupant information would be passed on to tenants.
Councillor Griffiths said all options will be covered; the customers will now be dealing directly with the water boards so it’s down to them.
Councillor Hicks asked if the council would be writing to tenants to inform them when the transfer is.
Councillor Griffiths said they will receive a letter and tenants will then need to contact them directly.