Meeting documents

The Housing Manager provided an update to Members of the PAG and particularly made reference to the following information:

·         The period of July and August saw significant turnover within the temporary accommodation units due to the completion of both the new temporary accommodation units at 1-12 Walters Court and the new affordable rented homes on the Denham Media Park development. This had helped to reduce the number of households that SBDC was placing in nightly booked accommodation. As a comparison in April last year SBDC had 36 households in nightly booked units and this had reduced to 10 households in August 2019.

·         The new units at 1-12 Walters Court were completed and leased to Bucks Housing Association from August 2019. Lettings commenced during that week with the flats being occupied in phases over subsequent weeks. Two flats in 801 Bath road adjacent have been completed and will be available for temporary accommodation shortly.

·         There were indications that SBDC was seeing an upturn in homelessness applications during the first months of 2019/20 which could be related to the measures introduced by the Homelessness Reduction Act.

·         Denham Film Studios had provided 63 flats for affordable rent and 27 for shared ownership. 30 affordable rented flats were being advertised by Buck Home Choice in April 2019 and the remaining 33 were let during August/September 2019.

·         SBDC and three other District Councils had jointly commissioned with Community Impact Bucks a Handy Helpers Scheme as a one year pilot to deliver minor repairs, adaptions and help with day to day tasks to older and vulnerable people. This Scheme was separate to the Disabled Facilities Grant. The Principal Leisure and Communities Officer also made reference to the Outreach Programme which provided additional support.

·         In relation to Environmental Health, 509 people had registered to use the Noise App; 37 cases were under investigation, 246 were resolved and 19 pending a response.

·         Legislation relating to Unauthorised Encampments was pending. The Council had agreed not to proceed with the use of injunctions last November. Wycombe District Council had applied for and tested an injunction for over 100 sites it owns. The partnership has agreed to take a watching brief on the impact of the injunction to consider whether a county wide injunction was practicable for the new Buckinghamshire Council.

·         The Leisure and Community Manager referred to the small grants application process; there had been a record number of 38 valid applications following the deadline being extended to 30 September 2019. All wards had attracted at least one application with some wards such as Iver attracting very high numbers. The next step would be to decide which applications were to be allocated funding.

Members asked a number of questions and the following points were noted:-

·         London and Quadrant Housing had paused new development because of the downturn in the housing market. There were still developments in the pipeline but they were not looking at future development. The Council had a liaison meeting with L&Q later this week and would have more detail on their business plans. However, the Council were not concerned about this issue. The Housing Manager reported that there were a number of alternative providers who were active in Buckinghamshire such as Paridigm and Hightown.

·         A Member made reference to the topping up ceremony which was being held for the redevelopment of Gerrards Cross Police Station Site on 4 October 2019 which included 14 affordable homes.

·         In relation to the Noise App, Members noted that pre-registration was required to capture data on the Noise App although residents could still record without registering. Some residents would have downloaded the Noise App for future use; it did not necessarily mean that there were cases to investigate. The Noise App made it easier for officers to close down cases quickly that could not be resolved by the Council.

·         A Member referred to the interventions in unauthorised encampment sites in South Bucks and the number of incursions which wasted officer time. The Housing Manager referred to the county-wide injunction above which would be discussed along with other options in the work streams for the new Buckinghamshire Council. Reference was made to the incursion into the Council’s car park, near Sainsbury and travellers accessing the car park despite the height barrier.

·         With regard to grant applications Members noted that if some wards did not have enough valid applications for their area then some of the funding could be transferred to other areas but this would need to be decided by Members.

Cllr Bastiman entered the meeting at 6.30pm.