Agenda and minutes

None.

The minutes of the meeting held on 15 April 2009 were approved as an accurate record.

Neighbourhood Services to conduct a workshop on Neighbourhood Management Issues.

The Head of Neighbourhood Services delivered a presentation about new neighbourhood management arrangements within the council.  The new arrangements would help to empower local communities and leaders.

The presentation covered areas such as the previous Neighbourhood Investment Programme, Drivers for Change, the Sustainable Communities Strategy and Local Area Agreement, Comprehensive Area Assessment, the new Area Committees and the future development of Peterborough.

The following information was provided through the presentation and responses to questions:

·         To ensure the best services were delivered, greater communication and feedback was needed from communities. 

·         Funding sources were being investigated along with lobbying for greater funding from central government to provide service delivery for Peterborough’s growing population:  These funds were not area specific but for Peterborough as a whole.

·         Spending and delivery of council services would be targeted at communities’ needs and therefore spent more effectively and efficiently. 

·         There would be a need to ensure that Parishes and the Council did not attempt to provide the same services as this would lead to unnecessary spending and taxing of Parished areas.  The funding for Parish provided services in non-Parished areas would have been decided centrally but the new management arrangements would alleviate this need.

·         Designated planning officers would be allocated to each area team. 

·         When advising the area manager of issues in Wards and Parishes, it would be the manager’s responsibility to action the requests and saying that funding was not available would not be an excuse.  

·         Funding would be ring-fenced for each area much like resources within Children’s Services were starting to be allocated on a locality basis.

·         The areas have been drawn on population numbers so resources would be evenly shared; discussions on S106 allocations were still ongoing.

·         The new Management arrangements would be effective as soon as area managers were appointed.

The members present AGREED to take the four questions from the presentation back to their Parishes and provide responses at the next meeting.

To be tabled at the next meeting and the supporting officer to report back on any questions raised in the interim.

The Chairman proposed that the Parish Council Liaison work programme reflects that of the Scrutiny Commission for Rural Communities and introduced the Greater Peterborough Partnership’s Rural Vision and Strategy; the next Rural Commission would be looking at Environmental issues.

The next agenda could include the following:

1. Local Area Committees – Adrian Chapman
2. Environment
3. Signage in villages (size of signs)
4. Quality Councillor Scheme – Ian Dewar/Adrian Chapman
5. Housing developments (update on progress for 20,000 new homes)
6. Updates on Key Issues in the city – topics to be emailed to supporting officer.