Meeting documents

Any changes will be reported at the meeting.

There were none.

To approve as a correct record the Minutes of the meeting held on 18 July 2016, copy attached as Appendix A.

RESOLVED –

That the minutes of the meeting held on 18 July 2016 be approved as a correct record.

Members to declare any interests.

The draft Vale of Aylesbury Local Plan (VALP) had been approved for consultation at Council on 28 June 2016, with the closing date for responses being 5 September 2016.

A pre-submission consultation draft VALP would be prepared for consideration by this committee, Cabinet and Council in March 2017.

During the consultation period around 1,600 responses were received, containing over 5,000 representations. Council officers had been considering the responses and emerging evidence to be able to determine the content of the pre-submission version of VALP. They were also revising the local plan’s policies and proposals. The results of this work would be available when the pre-submission draft VALP was published for the Scrutiny Committee in March 2017. A summary of the responses was being prepared by outside consultants.

The main issues raised were:-

·         The overall level of housing;

·         Meeting unmet need from other areas;

·         The possible new settlement;

·         Provision of infrastructure such as schools and roads;

·         Removal of land from the Green Belt;

·         Distribution of development; and

·         Development in the villages.

Housing need figures were also central to the preparation of the new local plan. Since the production of the draft VALP, the Buckinghamshire Councils had commissioned an update to reflect the latest Government projections. A copy of the draft report had been published on AVDC’s website Link to Document Members were advised that housing figures had been revised and that AVDC’s housing need had been reduced by 2,000 dwellings. Overall, the  reduction of dwellings for the Buckinghamshire authorities was around 5,000 (Wycombe District’s need had reduced by just under 2,200). This had been shown to be due to a number of factors including a decline in household size; people were not moving from larger to smaller properties as quickly as had been anticipated and despite people living longer overall, which would have prompted a need for new builds, this is not anticipated to happen as quickly as previously projected therefore more existing homes were being "recycled".

Officers had also sought to reduce the unmet need from Wycombe, Chiltern and South Bucks District Councils through the continuing Duty to Co-operate. Both Wycombe and Chiltern/South Bucks had been able to find capacity for another 1,200 homes each. Overall this meant that AVDC would now be working to a figure of 26,800 homes and the Strategy would need re-writing. Therefore the timetable for submission had been pushed back by 8 weeks and the DCLG had been informed.

Work was also continuing to finalise a range of evidence that would be required before submission. These included:-

·         Conclusions on the unmet housing needs of the other Buckinghamshire councils;

·         Flooding and water usage to be evaluated through a Strategic Flood Risk Assessment and Water Cycle Study;

·         Mitigation of traffic impacts on proposed development;

·         Clarification of the traveller needs assessment study;

·         Potential for releasing employment land;

·         Further assessment of land availability in relation to larger and medium villages; and

·         An infrastructure delivery plan had been drafted and work to assess the viability of the policies and proposals  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.