Councillor RM Hannaford (Portfolio Holder for Housing and Community Involvement) and Councillor Sheldon (Portfolio Holder for Environment and Leisure) will present half year reports and take questions.
Minutes:
Councillor Choules declared a personal interest as an employee of the University of Exeter.
Councillors R.M. Hannaford and Sheldon presented progress reports on priorities within theHousing and Community Involvement Portfolio and the Environment and Leisure Portfolio respectively. The priorities are set out below, together with responses (in italics) given to Members’ queries:
Housing and Community Involvement
· to provide a supply of high quality, social rented housing within the City in light of new Government policy;
· to provide at least 150 new units of affordable housing;
· publish an annual report to tenants which includes the agreed targets within the Local Offers and the Council’s performance against these Offers as per the Tenancy Services Authority (TSA) regulatory requirements;
· to review the Neighbourhood Management Policy;
· to work with Devon County Council on how older persons’ housing support services are provided in Exeter to tenants in the future;
· to encourage good quality privately rented accommodation whilst recognising the need for managing the impact of HMO’s upon established communities; and
· to work pro-actively with all agencies to prevent homelessness and work to support those that are.
· it was anticipated that the release of private sector accommodation not required for student accommodation would be greater than originally thought;
· the kitchen and bathroom replacement programme was now being run by the Contracts Unit and there would be a move towards greater emphasis on giving work to local, smaller companies including individual builders engaged to work on individual void properties; and
· the risk of further subsidence affecting properties neighbouring the recently demolished flats at Chestnut Avenue was being monitored by a surveying company. It was hoped to progress replacement build on the site as soon as possible.
Environment and Leisure
· to open the Royal Albert Memorial Museum in December 2011;
· to enhance the City’s parks and play areas;
· to keep the City clean and pleasant for everyone; and
· to minimise waste and build on re-cycling rates.
The fourth sentence in the first bullet point was amended to read “All City Councillors will be invited to an event on 13 December to which two residents from each ward will also be invited.”
· proposed improvement works to the paths in Belmont Park would be funded by either revenue or capital funds depending on the scale of the works, but not from unrelated Section 106 monies;
· progress was being made to improve back lane bin collections. For example, residents had been offered choices in respect of domestic waste collection including wheelie bins for a front of house collection or bins provided for storing bags in back yards with seagull resistant bags as an option;
· a reduction in newspaper purchase by the general public would be reflected in the recycling figures, however as Devon County Council recycling facilities in Marsh Barton and Pinhoe were not included in City Council figures, the true picture for Exeter would be higher than 37%;
· residents of Sylvan Heights would be consulted on proposals for a new play area;
· as the Waste Disposal Authority, the County Council had proceeded with an energy from waste plant as the option for Exeter, therefore, a separate collection of food waste would not be a viable proposition now; and
· there was no intention of considering the re-introduction of a weekly bin collection currently. A report would be submitted to the next meeting of this Committee on refuse collection issues including incentivisation schemes for waste minimisation.
The Portfolio Holder had looked in detail at the scheme operating in Windsor and Maidenhead and he outlined why it would not be feasible in Exeter. He confirmed that he was satisfied that plans were in place to minimise disruption to the waste collection service in the event of extreme weather but emphasised that problems could still be anticipated if the weather was similar to that experienced over the 2010 Christmas period. He referred to Devon County Council’s plan to grit and clear fewer roads over the winter months and that would be a key issue with regard to safe road access.
Scrutiny Committee – Community noted the reports.