Decision details

The Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) is a document that we must produce and keep up to date to ensure effective community involvement at all stages in the planning process. It sets out how anyone who lives, works, plays or carries out business in the Buckinghamshire Council area can be involved in local planning decisions and the preparation of planning documents.

The Council was required to produce and keep an up-to-date Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) to ensure effective community involvement at all stages in the planning process.  The Council had consulted on a draft SCI from February to April 2021.  The SCI had been updated to respond to the feedback from the consultation and this updated version was submitted to Cabinet for adoption by the Council.  It set out the main issues raised and the Council’s response to those issues.

The SCI explained when, how, and for what reasons the community would be able to participate in planning issues. These included plan making (local plans), Supplementary Planning Documents, neighbourhood plans, planning applications, and planning enforcement.

The main aim of the SCI was to make consultation and involvement in planning more transparent, accessible, collaborative, inclusive and consistent.  As a minimum, the Council would comply with any legislation that was currently in force or came into force in the future. These legal requirements were therefore included as actions that ‘we will’ do in the SCI as opposed to ones that ‘we may’ do. It was however recognised that there needed to be a flexible approach to engagement depending on the scale, subject matter and sensitivity of the matter in hand.

RESOLVED –

That the Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) be adopted.