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 Elliot Finance & Resources
Councillor Mrs Griffiths Housing
Councillor Harden Residents & Corporate Services
Councillor G Sutton Planning and Regeneration
Councillor Marshall Environmental, Sustainability and Regulatory Services
Minutes:
5.1 By the Mayor:
A one minute silence was held in remembrance of Borough and Parish Councillor Alan Fantham, and former Mayor Charles Barling.
5.2 By the Chief Executive:
There were no announcements from the Chief Executive.
5.3 By the Group Leaders:
Councillor Williams gave apologies on behalf of Councillors Adeleke, Adshead, Bateman, Brown, Clark, Griffiths, Mahmood, Matthews, Ritchie and Whitman.
5.4. Council Leader and Members of the Cabinet:
Councillor Williams, Leader of the Council and Portfolio Holder for Community Leadership
The Leader had nothing to announce but welcomed any questions.
Questions:
Councillor Tindall asked if there was any information on our application for funding of The Bury, in order to convert it into a Museum. Councillor Williams advised they hadn’t submitted a funding bid, and were still working on that in conjunction with the DHT. He couldn’t give the exact timetable but was happy to provide Councillor Tindall with a written response. He said they would have to submit a preliminary bid or expression of interest by July or August of this year. A full bid will take another year on top of that, and what has happened in the interim, is that previously bids up to £2 million, which is where we were, when we were assessed at a regional level, and bids over that are assessed at national level. He explained that they’ve reorganised their funding mechanism, which is unfortunate in our case because bids of up to 2 million will now be assessed at a national level. It is likely to be into 2019 before we get to that stage
Councillor England said, as part of the debate in November at Full Council on the Public Space Protection Orders, the Council Leader stated that he was happy to share the results of the consultation by the end of November. He highlighted that it’s now January and the report hasn’t been circulated, and asked if that meant he’s not so happy to share the results of the analysis. Councillor Williams said he was more than happy to share the results, however it wasn’t his decision whether the results are shared and it was due to be reported to the Overview and Scrutiny Committees at some stage. He said he would take Councillor England’s word for what he thinks he said in November, and apologised if Councillor England had misunderstood what he was saying as he wasn’t thinking that we would be circulating that feedback in isolation. He advised that he did have the results but was only briefed on it in the last few days.
Councillor Mills explained that Tring is likely to lose its last bank in June of this year and asked if the Leader would write a letter of concern and support the local inhabitants of Tring that the loss of the bank will not be in Tring’s favour. It will be a lot of possible loss of business, because businesses will not be able to bank in Tring, either they’ll have to go elsewhere, either in Aylesbury or in Berkhamsted. He said if we can get the bank to withdraw its notice that would be ideal, because this is the last of 3 banks that we had in Tring. Councillor Williams said he was more than happy to write to the bank and ask them to reconsider the decision about closing the bank in Tring. He said he had followed the tales of banking closures over the years; the banks do seem to be fairly thick-skinned and, and not very responsive to these community calls but we can only but try.
There were no more questions.
Councillor Elliot, Portfolio Holder for Finance and Resources
Finance & Resources
Commercial Assets & Property Development
We have started the demolition of the Civic Centre which will ultimately enable the development of much needed high quality housing on the site. Contractors are currently focusing on the asbestos strip out before starting the structural work.
We have now gained planning permission for the creation of the new cemetery at Bunkers Park and the project for construction will be tendered shortly. We are currently short of burial space in Hemel and the new cemetery should meet demand for the next 75 years.
The garage disposal programme is continuing with 13 sites currently in the disposal pipeline. The majority of these sites are being sold to Housing Associations and will therefore lead to the provision of much needed affordable housing in the borough, as well as providing significant capital receipts for the Council and reducing borrowing for the Capital Programme moving forward.
Revenues & Benefits
Working with all other councils within Hertfordshire, DBC is currently undertaking a review of council tax single person discounts, which will help make sure that everyone is paying the correct amount of tax.
Letters have been sent to around 2,000 residents where additional checks show there is a risk that a change affecting the discount has not been reported to us. We estimate that this exercise will identify just over £20,000 of extra income for the Council.
Finance
The draft 2018/19 budget was presented to joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee on 5 December 2018. The final budget proposal will go back to joint Overview and Scrutiny Committee on 6th February, before being proposed to Cabinet a week later.
The budget position for the third quarter of 2017/18 forecasts that the Council should finish the year within budget. This underlines the Council’s across-the-board success in finding ever more innovative ways of meeting the financial challenges in order to protect front-line services.
Commissioning, Procurement and Compliance
The team is currently working through the mobilisation and implementation of the new Parking Enforcement Service contract with Indigo Park Services UK Limited, which will deliver savings to the Council in excess of £100k per annum.
In addition to the significant financial benefits, the new service will introduce a range of innovations such as contactless payments for parking and an on-line portal for parking permits, which will deliver improvements to the quality of service for residents and visitors to Dacorum. The contract also provides for closer working with local schools on enforcement issues to improve road safety.
Questions:
Councillor Tindall said he was pleased about the announcement about the parking services upgrade. He asked if the Portfolio Holder could confirm that this will include new parking machines that will actually include the car number of the individual car so that the Council will not suffer losses of revenue because people exchange parking tickets between themselves, when one’s leaving and somebody else is coming in. He then asked if this will also be able to give the Council data, as to when the car parks are being used so that if, as is sometimes believed, that the income from Sunday does not meet the cost of the wages of the wardens, then we might actually return to free Sunday parking. Councillor Elliot said he would have to come back to him on both his questions.
There were no more questions.
Councillor Griffiths, Portfolio Holder for Housing
Tenant & Leaseholder Services
Councillor Williams made the following announcements on behalf of Councillor Griffiths.
This month the Education Welfare and Support Officers moved from Strategic Housing to the Tenancy Sustainment team. This team offer support to residents in temporary accommodation and in the first 6 months of their new tenancies whether that is with DBC or through the Councils Help to Rent scheme. This move will improve the continuity in support for vulnerable residents transitioning from temporary to settled accommodation and ensure that the start of tenancy process is as smooth as possible.
We also launched ‘Friends Together’ sessions, named and led by tenants, who meet at Liberty Tea Room in Bank Court. The aim of the sessions is to combat social isolation and bring people together. This is a group for tenants that we are working with, or have worked with in the past, to meet and chat over a cup of tea and a slice of cake in a relaxed atmosphere. The two sessions to date have been a great success with tenants keeping in touch outside of the group. Two of the tenants are now working together to access further education that they wouldn’t have felt confident to do alone.
Strategic Housing
The communication of the Allocations Policy changes to our customers commenced on Monday 15 January. The full implementation of the policy will be complete by April 2018.
Roadshows are currently being undertaken by Tenants & Leaseholders services to inform tenants of the changes in relation to the collection of water rates.
Progress is well underway with the development of the Homeless Reduction Act toolkit, which includes production of new procedures, staff toolkits and training documentation to support the implementation.
The Private Sector Housing Enforcement Team is moving into the Housing service from 22 January 2018, with a particular focus on Private Rented accommodation and Houses in Multiple Occupation, energy efficiency and Disabled facilities Grant.
Housing Development
Kylna Court – Works are progressing well on site, concrete frame completed.
Swing Gate Lane (Corn Mill Court) – Works are progressing well on site on the new build. A Planning application has been submitted to convert the 3 existing units into 3 houses rather than 2 houses.
Martindale School site – The Planning application has been approved and we are currently seeking the first stage of tenders to find a suitable Contractor. The aim is to be on site late Summer 2018.
Northend and Westerdale garage sites – Planning applications have been approved and we are preparing tenders to find a suitable Contractor. The aim is to be on site late Summer 2018.
Stationers Place – We are preparing a revised Planning application to deal with challenges around the existing culvert that is at the rear of the site. This will provide approx. 25 / 26 flats. We are carrying out a package of advanced enabling works on site to deal with a number of issues in the ground including boreholes, culverts and relocating some pipes and cables. This will commence during February.
Property & Place
Gas Contract - Sun Realm
The Q2 audit for this financial year is underway and a review of the contractor’s books will be undertaken to validate the position. Current projections for the gain share are for a further £90K of savings which will be reinvested in delivering additional installations in this financial year.
The compliance rates remain consistently high at 99.99%, even over the Christmas period, which is very positive.
Total Asset Management - Osborne
Osborne is working closely with the Dacorum Contract team to develop plans for estate improvements, which will be delivered over the next five years.
The Q2 audit of TAM is about to be concluded and current projections are for a saving of circa £130K to be received by Dacorum. There has been extensive work carried out on the valuations to ensure that value for money can be demonstrated and that any further efficiencies that are identified are implemented by Osborne.
Compliance
A new officer has been appointed to the Compliance team, who will undertake the ongoing management of asbestos within the housing stock and they will be working closely with the contractors to ensure the safety of our tenants, whilst work is being undertaken in their homes.
Questions:
Councillor Tindall asked if there had been any progress with the approach from County to create a local area board in order to work together to produce more housing units for those disadvantaged, learning difficulties and those that need special housing. Councillor Williams said he would need to speak with Councillor Griffiths and provide Councillor Tindall with a written response.
There were no more questions.
Councillor Harden, Portfolio Holder for Residents and Corporate Services
Resident Services
The Old Town Hall had a very busy season leading up to Christmas, some of this is a bit dated, because we haven’t seen each-other since the end of the year. So new Christmas lights were installed in 5 neighbourhood action areas and the switch on events were all well attended.
ICT – DBC has been certified sufficiently secure to connect to the PSN for another 12 months.
The desktop replacement programme award has been made, selected suppliers. The tender is currently out for renewing the hardware of our data centres and the CRM solution developed in-house will replace the current Northgate product.
The resident portal is about to go out for internal testing.
And to conclude, I would like to put on record my grateful thanks for the career of Julie Still, Group Manager for Resident Services, who has decided to take early retirement. Julie oversaw The Old Town Hall, CCTV, Anti-Social Behaviour, Neighbourhood Action, Dacorum Community Safety Partnership, Youth Democracy, Adventure Playgrounds and Community Engagement. With a professional, knowledgeable manner and with a genuine care and compassion for the residents she dealt with, especially those who are vulnerable in our society. I viewed her as a hard working colleague who knew her department and a good friend, who always had time for the concerns of Members. I am sure colleagues will agree with me that she will be missed.
And just on that point of where Resident Services will sit in the future, just to say that CCTV will move from my portfolio and will go under the portfolio of Councillor Elliot, under Procurement and Commissioning. Anti-Social Behaviour will move from my portfolio and go under the portfolio of Councillor Marshall, with Environmental Health and I still have everything else. So, if Members want to get in touch with us on those issues, they know where to get them.
Questions:
Councillor Birnie said he was interested to hear what Councillor Harden said about Julie Still and totally concurred with that but when he approached that section in the Council and asked about the possibility of setting up a new neighbourhood action committeein Bennetts End, the response he got, not from Julie Still, was that the Council no longer support these Committees. Councillor Harden said we do support neighbourhood action still but what we don’t do is support new neighbourhood action sites, so the neighbourhood action that we currently have is still in existence, because that is something that Members still appreciate and still value. He explained they were looking at developing the model; the issue they have is that there are areas that don’t have neighbourhood action are not being represented, so they are looking at changing the model. He advised we had a meeting last year that a few Councillors attended where we had a theatre group come in and do a presentation for them and did engagement with the community that he thought was very enjoyable, so they are looking at ways of developing how we can communicate with those residents that aren’t in neighbourhood action areas.
Councillor Douris started by declaring that he was a shareholder within Aviva, the insurance company. He asked if Councillor Harden would join with him in welcoming the fact that at 18:41 this evening, he received an email from the Aviva Community Fund letting him know that, amongst others, the 2nd Hemel Hempstead Grovehill Scout Group had been awarded £1,000, or up to £1,000 having secured 1,423 votes in the Aviva Community Fund Scheme, so well done to 2nd Hemel Hempstead Scout Group. Also, well done to Aviva, which also goes to show that larger organisations can have a community at heart. Councillor Harden endorsed the comment of his colleague. He said it’s great to see that the Council here also had a fund, in the value of about £70,000 that goes out to communities 3 rounds per year and colleagues totally are aware of that. He said to please encourage your communities to apply for that fund, it’s always really rewarding and beneficial to see how far the Council can give, even at £500 or £1,000, to something, how far that goes to benefit the community.
Councillor Maddern explained that the Dacorum Community Fund on behalf of the Collett School, which she was now working at, received a grant for £3,000. She said it was a fantastic scheme and just wanted to say thank you very much.
Councillor Birnie asked if Councillor Harden would please undertake to meet with him to explain what an action list ward like Bennetts End, can look for in the way of decisions from the Council. Councillor Harden said he would be glad to meet with Councillor Birnie.
Councillor Taylor said he wondered if the Portfolio Holder would be pleased to learn that in Gadebridge, we support the Dacorum Headquarters for Home Start, and Amazon gave Home Start £1,250 towards a summer party for the children in the Home Start system. They held that at the Gadebridge Community Association and it was roaring success, and it was good to see Amazon there with their cameras. Councillor Harden said it was encouraging that although we get heckled by the community for decisions we make, you do find that there are successful, commercial organisations in this country that have money available that they can spend on the community, and it is wonderful to hear that tonight.
There were no more questions.
Councillor G Sutton, Portfolio Holder for Planning and Regeneration
Consultation on the new Local Plan ‘Issues and Options’, which looks at the future shape of Dacorum, ended on 13 December with a record number of responses being received. The views and comments expressed by residents and organisations will now be considered before the Council starts to make decisions about which sites to select for development, later in 2018.
Dacorum Borough Council has won the award for the best Heritage and Conservation from the National Landscape Institute for The Water Gardens Regeneration project.
The Brownfield Land Register (Part One) was published on December 31 2017 in line with the requirements of DCLG. It is available on the DBC website with a range of information on the previously developed sites that have been identified.
There were no questions for the Portfolio Holder.
Councillor Marshall, Portfolio Holder for Environmental, Sustainability and Regulatory Services
As a result of the significant snow fall in the morning of 10 December, there was widespread damage to many trees, healthy trees –mostly evergreens onto whose foliage the wet snow held like glue. The clear up operations on the 190 odd reported incidents should be completed within days. As a priority all evergreen trees and all trees in prominent and high use areas, for which DBC are responsible for management, are being inspected.
Allied to that, refuse collection was disrupted and refuse crews worked on salting and clearing shopping centres and elderly persons complexes. There then followed the Christmas and New Year break. Nevertheless, with Saturday working on 3 weekends, the refuse service was back to normal by the 2nd week this month.
And to look forward to in the Spring – over 100,000 bulbs have been planted for spring flowering.
Councillor Marshall invited questions.
Questions:
Councillor Tindall referred to the decision by China to rejectthis country’s recycling waste, and asked whether or not the Officers could prepare a statement about the effect on the Council and possibly the financial impact of having to find what the effect will be on the recycling that we do and where it goes. Councillor Marshall respectfully suggested that Councillor Tindall referred to a press release that was issued by the County Council, in with County Councillor Terry Holme, explained that it’s nothing to be frightened of or be concerned, there are other markets, there are other countries in the Far East, particularly, and also India, who are continuing to accept plastics. She said when she listened and watched the BBC news, it was exceedingly interesting and concerning, and she made enquiries. Basically the bottom line is, we should not be concerned, and there will be no detrimental impact on us in the foreseeable future.
Councillor Tindall asked that when we are looking at this whole issue and if we have any control over where it goes, we don’t add to India’s pollution problems, which he believed are far disastrous and that he didn’t see why we should export our problems to other countries. He felt we should actually come up with our own solutions. Councillor Marshall understood that the County Council as the waste disposal authority are looking at the issue of disposal of our waste, including incineration. She took Councillor Tindall’s point, and need to be assured that where we’re sending the waste plastic material or whatever materials, they are being properly treated.
There were no more questions for the Portfolio Holder.