CITY BOARD 26 March 2001
(6.00pm – 8.00pm)
PRESENT: Councillors Howarth (Chair), Bagnall, Currie, Durrant, Harrison, Nimmo-Smith, Reed, C. Rosenstiel, Slatter, Stuart, Talbot, Taylor.
FOR adoption by THE
COUNCIL
01/A/22 REVENUE AND CAPITAL BUDGETS – CARRY FORWARDS AND SIGNIFICANT VARIANCES
The Director of Finance’s report reminded members that, at its last meeting, the Board had considered the revenue budget for the next financial year, 2001/02, together with revisions to the budget for the current year, 2000/01, both for its own services and the overall position for the Council.
The proposed budgets had been submitted to Council on 15 February 2001 for consideration as part of the overall Council budget strategy and in the light of the revised and now final, Government Settlement (announced on 15 December and 31 January 2001 respectively). The report highlighted any new or changed circumstances requiring consideration.
Requests from Committees to carry forward budgets from 2000/01 into 2001/02 were set out in Appendix A to the report. Underspending in 2000/01 would have the effect of increasing the amount of reserves available at 1 April 2001 by a corresponding amount. As a result, approval of these carry forwards would not increase the net budget requirement for 2001/02.
In setting its budget strategy, City Board had approved sums to be treated as specific funds for the purpose of the budget process, which for City Board Services were shown in Appendix B to the report. These funds had now been allocated to relevant spending committees and the report presented the latest position for the 2000/01 Revised and 2001/02 Original Budgets. An information bulletin, presenting an overview of all the bids and savings, had been despatched separately.
The report also indicated the impact of significant variations from the 2000/01 revised budgets that had been highlighted by committees during this cycle in order to provide context for decisions on carry forward requests. The projected effects of significant variations and requests to carry forward budgets was shown in Appendix C to the report.
Council is recommended (with no votes against) to:
Revenue Budgets:
1) Approve the carry forward of an estimated total of £729,130 budgets, detailed in Appendix A, from 2000/01 into 2001/02, including two new requests identified for Property and Administration Subcommittee and Community Development and Leisure Committee since these met.
2) Approve the use of contingency to cover the cost of urgent flood protection work required recently, currently estimated at £40,694. (see minute 01/a/32)
Capital
Budgets:
3) Approve the following, with rephasing where appropriate, for inclusion into the Capital Plan:
i. Add to the Capital Plan – CCTV equipment replacement, estimated at £75,000 in 2001/02, funded £55,000 from existing Repair and Renewal and £20,000 carry forward revenue underspend from 2000/01 as referred from Property and Administration Sub-Committee. (see minute 01/a/37)
ii. Amend the Capital Plan – to advance the purchase of one vehicle, estimated at £100,000 to 2000/01, to be funded from existing Repair and Renewal provision, to replace a damaged vehicle ahead of scheduled as approved by Chair and Spokespersons of Environment Committee and Chair of City Board under emergency powers (item currently in the capital plan in 2001/02, reference SC093). (see minute 01/a/40)
iii. Add to the Capital Plan – to include the earmarked fund for sports development. (see minute 01/a/28)
iv. Add to the Capital Plan – a grant of £25,000 agreed to Cambridge United Football Club, towards the re-development of the Abbey Stadium. (see minute 01/a/31)
v. Approve the use of any balance of the £1.7m use of reserves approved for the Housing Capital Programme in 2000/01 to fund Housing General Fund capital activities in the 2001/02 programme. (see minute 01/g/23)
01/A/23 ADOPTION
OF REVISED TREASURY MANAGEMENT POLICY STATEMENT
The report of the Director of Finance set out the
updated Treasury Management Policy Statement of the Council. The revised
statement required the approval of Property and Administration Sub-Committee
and City Board before going to full Council for adoption.
Council is recommended that the revised version of the Council’s Treasury Management Policy Statement, attached as appendix B, supersede all other and be approved for adoption by the Council.
CITY BOARD 26 March 2001
(6.00pm – 8.00pm)
PRESENT: Councillors Howarth (Chair), Bagnall, Currie, Durrant, Harrison, Nimmo-Smith, Reed, C. Rosenstiel, Slatter, Stuart, Talbot, Taylor.
FOR INFORMATION OF THE COUNCIL
01/a/24 MINUTES
The minutes of the meeting held on 29 January 2001 were confirmed as a
correct record and signed by the Chair.
01/a/25 APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE
No apologies for absence were received.
01/a/26 DECLARATIONS OF
INTEREST
The following Councillors declared non-pecuniary (Code of Conduct) interests:
Councillors Howarth and Reed as contributors to the University Superannuation Scheme. (Minute 01/a/42)
Councillor Talbot as a relative was employed at Parkside Pools (Minute 01/a/28)
Councillor Talbot as a season ticket holder of Cambridge United Football Club (Minute 01/a/31)
Councillor Taylor as her partner was an investor in the
Bank of New York. (Minute 01/A/23)
01/a/27 PUBLIC QUESTION TIME
There were no questions from the public.
01/a/28 REFERENCE
FROM COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT & LEISURE COMMITTEE (8 MARCH 2001) – PARKSIDE
POOLS LOTTERY FUNDING
The Community Development & Leisure Committee had considered a report at its meeting on 8 March and noted the officers’ recommendation that further discussions would be required with Sport England on the detail of the use of funding as both the Council and Sport England were keen to ensure the money was spent appropriately in expanding sport participation. Reports to Community Development and Leisure Committee and City Board would follow in light of these discussions.
The Committee had broadly supported the schemes in Schedule A of the officers’ report and noted that those in Schedule B would be considered during the Best Value Review of the Sports Services. It was agreed that no decision on spending would be made until there had been further discussions with Sport England.
The Chief Executive said that these further discussions had taken place with Sport England who had endorsed the broader use of funding and a consequential change in the name of the fund to ‘Sports Development’. He said that Community Development and Leisure Committee would consider the detail of bids to the fund, and any suggestions by members of the Board could be taken into account.
Members commented on the need for
· consideration of wider options, for example, improved access for people with disabilities at all swimming pools in the city and the installation of heating at Sheeps Green Learner Pool.
· support of the joint use of facilities at school premises to provide improved access for the community from the fund.
· provision of skateboarding facilities in the city.
Resolved that
1) an earmarked fund for further sports developments be established, based on the amount of the underspend on the original scheme of £403,062.
2) detailed proposals for bids be considered by the Community Development and Leisure Committee, including those shown above.
01/a/29 REFERENCE
FROM PROPERTY AND ADMINISTRATION SUB-COMMITTEE (13 MARCH 2001) – BEST VALUE
REVIEW OF DEMOCRATIC SERVICES.
On 13 March the Property and Administration
Sub-Committee had considered the outcome report and Continuous Improvement
Action Plan of the Democratic Services Best Value Review. The Review had covered the Council’s Committee,
Electoral and Members’ Services.
Referring to the Action Plan, Councillor
Bradnack had proposed an amendment to the Action Plan table as set out below,
the amendment being shown by italic text.
Action – Participate
in local democracy initiatives undertaken by the Council (add) and appropriate democratic participation of residents in their
localities in provision and potential variation of services provided by the
Council, with appropriate support from community development.
Reason – To promote local democracy
Timescale – Ongoing (replace
with) ‘from 2002’
To be achieved
by – All three sections (add) ‘community development’;
departments
Resource implications
– Staff time; possible costs (add)
additional budgetary provision in line with Labour’s 2001 proposed budget
£50,000
Councillor Bradnack had been of the view that
democratic participation had been absent from the Review and, if it were not
included there was a risk that it would not be considered at all.
Liberal Democrat members had been sympathetic
to the principles behind the amendment but had noted that the issues to be
addressed by the three small service areas, Committees, Electoral and Members,
in the Action Plan were part of (not exclusive of), the corporate approach to
democratic participation. In the near
future this would relate to issues such as moves to more localised decision
making and the new decision making structures in general.
Councillor Bradnack’s amendment at the
Subcommittee had been lost by 3 votes to 6 and he had referred the matter to
City Board.
The Chair of the Board said that the Liberal
Democrat group continued to be sympathetic to the view expressed by Councillor
Bradnack, but pointed out that there was already a budget in 2001/2 for
decentralisation, to enable the development of ideas for which bids could be
made in future years. His proposal that Councillor Bradnack’s amendment not be
accepted, save for the additional wording to the paragraph headed Action, was
carried by 6 votes to 0.
Resolved that the relevant paragraph of the Continuous Improvement Action Plan of
the Democratic Services Best Value Review be as shown below:
Action – Participate in local democracy initiatives undertaken by the Council and appropriate democratic participation of
residents in their localities in provision and potential variation of services
provided by the Council, with appropriate support from community development.
01/a/30 REVENUE AND CAPITAL BUDGETS – CARRY FORWARDS AND
SIGNIFICANT VARIANCES
See also Minute 01/A/22
Resolved (with no votes against)
Capital Budgets:
To approve the following, with rephasing where appropriate, for inclusion into the Capital Plan:
1) Add to the Capital Plan - Cycle Parking at Park Street, estimated at £17,500 in 2001/02, funded from Home Office as referred from Environment Committee
2) Amend the Capital Plan – to reflect the consolidation of the existing budgets for Traffic Management Initiatives and Road Safety Schemes – Crossings into one capital programme.
3) To agree, in view of the pressures on Housing Capital Financing, that as part of its review of the Council’s capital plan in July 2001, the City Board will consider whether further resources could be made available to fund Housing (non HRA) capital projects.
Action by Director of Finance
01/a/31 CAMBRIDGE UNITED FOOTBALL CLUB
The report by the Chief
Executive and Director of Finance set out the request from Cambridge United
Football Club for financial assistance towards their scheme for redevelopment
of the existing Abbey Stadium.
Councillor Bagnall’s proposal that the maximum match funding referred to in paragraph 2.2 of the report be increased to £50,000, and the funding be subject to the provision by the Football Club of a seat on its Board for a representative of the fans, and a performance monitoring programme for the development of the Stadium was lost by 5 votes to 7.
Resolved
(unanimously) that, subject to submission of a satisfactory Business Plan the
following be approved:
1)
a grant of
£25,000 towards the scheme for the redevelopment of the Abbey Stadium.
2)
additional
funding for the scheme up to a maximum of £25,000 to match an identified amount
of funding raised from the fan-based organisations.
Action by Chief Executive and Director of Finance
01/a/32 FLOODING – 3/19 FEBRUARY 2001
During
the period from 5 February to 7 February, Cambridge had experienced the worst
flooding problems since 1978. The area
of the city most seriously affected had been along Riverside where the river
came over the parapet wall and flooded the adjoining highway. Urgent action had been taken to deal with
this problem and had successfully prevented the flooding of a number of
residential properties. The threat of further flooding had continued for a few
more days and the sandbags and pumps had not been removed until 19 February.
Other areas of the city which suffered flooding, but where there was less potential for damage to property, had been at Sheeps Green and Lammas Land, Midsummer and Stourbridge Commons, Mariners Way, the Simoco Playing field, and low lying areas of Fen Road and Grantchester Meadows. Sand bags had been filled and distributed to residents in the Fen Road and Grantchester Meadows areas.
Discussions were underway with the
Environment Agency who were proposing measures to reduce the risk of such
flooding at Riverside happening in the future.
Measures currently proposed would require the agreement of all the
owners of residential property along Riverside. At the present time, agreement on this had not been reached;
however officers were in contact with the Environment Agency in order to try to
assist with finding a resolution to this problem.
This emergency
work, for which there was no current budget provision, had cost £40,694 and had
had to be carried out at short notice.
Resolved (with no votes against) that the use of contingency funds to meet this
expenditure be approved.
Action by Director of Environment & Planning
01/a/33 YOUR VOICE YOUR CHOICE PROGRAMME –
ADDITIONAL BID
The Board had established a new Internal Service Development Programme, known as Your Voice, Your Choice, to deal with service issues arising from the Council’s public consultation programme. Bids from the Programme had been sought from managers in October 2000 resulting in one application; some £22,300 had remained unallocated. A further bid had been received from the Environment & Planning Department in partnership with the Tidy Britain Group totalling £17,500 for the year 2001/02. The bid was to assist in the monitoring of the standard of street cleaning in the City.
Report
by Head of Strategy & Partnerships
01/a/34 CAPITAL
GRANTS 2000/01 – CAMBRIDGE SUSTAINABLE CITY AND CITY CENTRE MANAGEMENT
The report sought approval for four applications
made to Cambridge Sustainable City and City Centre Management; programmes of
£50,000 and £30,000 respectively had been established in 1997 and both funds
had since been extended for a further period of three years. Details of the
applications to these funds were set out in the report.
Members noted that access to the University Botanic
Garden was free for people with disabilities.
1)
the capital
grant from Cambridge Sustainable City in the sum of £9881.97 for a Cambridge
University Botanic Garden scheme for an audio guiding system. This will help the visually impaired, giving
access to the environment.
2)
the capital
grant from Cambridge Sustainable City in the sum of £6,000 for a Chesterton
allotment project for community composting to help reduce the amount of green
waste going to landfill.
3)
the capital
grant from Cambridge Sustainable City in the sum of £7,600 for a Cambridge
Sustainable City project to provide Octocentenary composter bins to the public
in the year 2001.
4)
the capital
grant from City Centre Management in the sum of £15,000 for a City Centre
Management project for new Christmas lights.
Action
by Director of Environment & Planning
01/a/35 BEST VALUE – IMPROVEMENTS TO THE
CORPORATE PROCESS
The report by the Head of Strategy and Partnerships set out the current position on the Best Value process within the Council from its inception on 1 April 2000. Since then the Council had reviewed a number of services as part of a five-year programme of fundamental service reviews as required by the Best Value process. A report to City Board on 29 January 2001 had recommended a number of changes to the Council’s five-year programme to make the reviews more focused and strategic. Officers had also reviewed the Council’s internal processes to see if there were other ways to improve the review process. This report made a number of recommendations about how this might be achieved.
Members commented on the need to achieve public awareness of the process and invite their involvement in it, particularly to ensure representation by ethnic minorities. There was also concern at the possible effect on staff if the process was viewed as being aimed solely at service areas that were not performing adequately. The Chair responded that the process was now targeted at areas in which there was potential for improvement.
Resolved (with no votes against) that the proposed changes to the Council’s corporate processes for Best Value outlined in section 4 of the report be approved.
Action
by Head of Strategy & Partnerships
01/a/36 BEST
VALUE REVIEW OF COMMUNITY SAFETY - PROJECT DEFINITION
The report by the Head of Strategy and Partnerships set out the details of the proposed project definition
for the Best Value Fundamental Service Review (BVFSR) of Community Safety. The Project Definition had been considered
by the Fundamental Service Review and Audit Working Party on 1 March 2001 and
their suggestions had been incorporated into the current draft.
It was suggested that a small group of members monitor progress of the
review.
Members commented on the possibility of public involvement by innovative
means such as siting the Police publicity bus on Parker’s Piece at the Big Day
Out and enlisting the support of the local media.
2)
the members
identified to monitor the progress of the review be Councillors Slatter, Stuart
and Ward, with one further member nominated by the Labour Group and Councillor
Taylor as an alternate member.
01/a/37 USE OF CCTV REPAIRS AND RENEWALS
FUND
The report by the Head of Property and Building
Services sought authorisation for expenditure from the CCTV Repairs and
Renewals Fund. The majority of work to upgrade equipment to enable the Park
Street and Queen Ann Terrace Car Parks
cameras to be monitored from the CCTV Control Room could be funded from
existing budgets and savings. The balance of £55,000 required to meet the costs
was to be funded from the CCTV Repairs and Renewals
Fund which required the approval of the Board and Council.
01/a/38 Local
Government Act 2000 – Implementation of New Structures
The officers had been working on a target date of November 2001 for implementing a leader/cabinet model and this date had been included in the report to the Periodic Electoral Review and Local Government Act Sub-Committee and City Board in January. However, the officers’ view now was that implementation from May 2002 would be preferable for the reasons set out below.
· It would allow members and officers more time to make sure all the detail of implementation was addressed.
· If there was to be a referendum, it would be necessary to work up a mayoral option in more detail, and it was likely that this would have to be done at the same time as preparation for implementation of the leader/cabinet model if November 2001 is to be the start date.
· Working up a mayoral option at the same time as implementing a leader/executive model could be confusing for officers and the public.
· A later start would allow members to build any additional cost of a new system into the budget process for 2002/3.
· The budget process for 2001/2 would not straddle two different systems.
The Council was expected to submit its constitutional proposals to the Secretary of State by the end of June 2001. The Department of Environment Transport and Regions guidance stated that, where the proposals involved a leader and cabinet form of arrangement, these should be implemented “as soon as reasonably practicable” after sending the proposals. In any event, the guidance suggested that "under normal circumstances" executive arrangements should be in place "as soon as reasonably practicable after [the] annual council meeting in May/June 2002", with a target for full operation by all authorities at the end of 2002.
The Sub-Committee endorsed
the officers’ recommendation that, for the reasons given above, an
implementation date of May 2002 was preferred.
Resolved that the City Board
endorse the recommendation by the Periodic Electoral Review and Local
Government Act Sub-Committee and approve a date of May 2002 for implementing a
leader/cabinet model structure.
01/a/39 CITY CENTRE DEVELOPMENT SUB-COMMITTEE
At its meeting on 3 April 2000, City Board had established the City Centre Development Sub-Committee and had delegated to it various matters relating to the development of the Grand Arcade project.
Officers were of the view that the Sub-Committee’s Terms of Reference should be amended to cover additional areas which had not been included in April 2000.
Resolved that the revised Terms of Reference of the Sub-Committee be approved as indicated below (italic text highlights the changes):
“The powers given below have been delegated from the City Board to the Sub-Committee, but with the ability also to discharge those powers being retained by the Board.
·
Act as the focal point for the assimilation of information relating to
the Grand Arcade scheme
·
Monitor progress of the Grand Arcade scheme and agree principles of Act timetable
·
Power to take decisions on Grand Arcade and Lion Yard related matters
which will include:
. detailed terms of the
development agreement head lease and
related agreements including
walkways and CCTV
. detailed terms of the indemnity agreement
. content of media releases
. authorising expenditure up to £50,000
in any financial year
. responses to
significant third parties including John Lewis Partnership, Aberdeen Property
Investments, Crowne Plaza and the Colleges
. Compulsory Purchase Order documentation
. Agree content of form of letters to
‘affected parties’ ”
The Director of City
Services reported that an order had been placed for a new refuse vehicle on 5
March, following consultation with the Chairs and Spokepersons of Environment
Committee and City Board. The urgent
action had been taken because a refuse vehicle had been irreversibly damaged
and an immediate replacement was required to ensure that refuse collection was
unaffected.
There was £700,000 (Repairs and Renewals) available in the Capital Plan
in 2001/02 for refuse vehicles. The
urgent action necessitated £100,000
being made available in 2000/01.
Resolved that the Council
be recommended to endorse the action.
01/a/41 EXCLUSION
OF PRESS AND PUBLIC
Resolved
that before considering the next item,
members of the press and public be excluded from the meeting on the grounds
that, if they were present, there would be disclosure to them of information
defined as exempt from publication by paragraphs 7 and 9 of Part 1 of Schedule
12A of the Local Government Act 1972.
01/a/42 LION YARD – ANNEXE CAR PARK
The report by Head of
Property and Building Services sought approval in principle to the extension of
the current Crowne Plaza site lease to accord more closely with the proposed
lease terms for the Grand Arcade Development and Lion Yard Shopping Centre.
Resolved that
1)
the grant of a
lease extension for the Crowne Plaza Hotel site as described in the report be
authorised in principle.
2)
authority for
agreeing the detailed terms of the lease be delegated to the City Centre
Development Subcommittee
Action by Head of Property and Building Services
The meeting ended at 8.00pm