Agenda and minutes

Members are invited to declare any personal or disclosable pecuniary interests, including the nature and extent of such interests they may have in any items to be considered at this meeting.

            If Councillors have any questions relating to predetermination, bias or interests in items on this Agenda, then please contact the Monitoring Officer in advance of the meeting.

*HC01         

Members were invited to declare any interests in the items of business to be discussed but none were made.

Minutes of meeting held 16 May 2017

*HC02         

The Minutes of the Hub Committee meeting held on 16^th May 2017 were confirmed and signed by the Chairman as a correct record, subject to the following amendments:

·           *HC 75 should be amended from “a Working Group of Members to comprise of the Task and Finish Review Group and Cllrs Edmonds and Sampson from the Hub Committee” to “a Working Group of Members to comprise of the Task and Finish Review Group and Cllrs Edmonds and Moody from the Hub Committee”;

·           *HC 76 title should be amended from “Future Garden Waste Design” to “Future Garden Waste Service Design”; and

·           *HC 77 should be amended to read that the “Lead Member for Strategic Planning and Housing” (rather than “Lead Member for Strategic Housing”).

*HC03         

 Cllr Sanders updated Members following the discussions held at the SH/WD JSG meeting that had taken place on the morning of 20 June 2017.  His update included the following points:

Single Council Proposal

•        A joint meeting had been scheduled for all Members of West Devon Borough Council and Members of South Hams District Council on 21st July. This would be a chance to meet with Department of Communities and Local Government and Local Government Association representatives and ask any questions on the One Council proposal;

•        A number of options were being considered to deal with council tax equalisation;

•        A draft set of consultation questions had been prepared for Members to consider;

•        Any consultation should run for at least 6 weeks over August and September 2017, as there would be events during August where there would be opportunity for face to face contact with residents;

•        Currently there was a recommendation for an Executive Leader and Cabinet model for a single new Council.  Further work would be undertaken to explore the role of the opposition in this model.  He did acknowledge that there may be an issue at West Devon over the role of the Ceremonial Mayor;

•        Financial modelling assumed that there would be no reduction in Members until 2023 – although this would be down for the Boundary Commission to decide and the Minister may put interim measures in place;

•        The recommendation to Hub Committee would be along the lines of “That Council be recommended to agree in principle to proceed with a single council and commence public consultation which will then be considered by Members in October 2017.”

Outsource or wholly owned company

•        An outline report was being developed with a number of proposals to be considered further at the SH/WD JSG meeting in July and a final set of proposals on the way forward would be presented at the JSG August meeting.

HC04         

Members were presented with a report that set out the business case, based on advice received, for the Investment in Commercial Property Strategy.  The objective of the proposed strategy was to generate revenue streams to contribute to the financial sustainability of the Council enabling it to deliver, and where possible improve, frontline services in line with the Council’s adopted strategy and objectives.

The Leader introduced the report and invited questions.  The s151 Officer and Group Manager Business Development responded to questions on risk mitigation and timing of key stages of the proposal. During discussion, Members expressed their support for the proposal.  The future budget gap required innovative proposals to come forward and this was considered to be an example of a proposal that could help to close that gap.  Members were mindful of the risks but accepted that the Strategy included methods to mitigate the majority of their concerns.  Members also noted that a key issue would be to seek the appropriate specialist support.

It was then RESOLVED that Council be RECOMMMENDED to:

1.     Approve and implement the proposed commercial property investment strategy as detailed in Appendix A;

2.     Agree that officers conclude an appropriate procurement process to commission specialists to work on behalf of the Council in relation to the proposed commercial property investment strategy;

3.     Delegate individual commercial property portfolio purchase and disposal decisions to the Head of Paid Service, in consultation with the s151 Officer, the Leader and the appointed Chair of the ‘Invest to Earn’ Group; and

4.     Borrow funds on fixed rate terms from the appropriate source in order to pursue this strategy.  To complete tranche 1 this would require borrowing of up to £26.75 million (£25 million plus acquisition costs of 7%).

*HC05         

ThePortfolioHolderforResources and Performance introduceda reportthat informed Members of thedebtwrittenoff forrevenuestreamswithinthe Revenueand Benefitsservice.  Debtsupto thevalueof £5,000werewrittenoffby the s151Officerunderdelegatedauthority.  Permissionwassoughtto writeoff individualdebts witha valueof morethan £5,000.  In respectof thedebtswitha valueof morethan£5,000,Memberswere advisedof howtheyhadarisen.

ItwasthenRESOLVED:

1.  That,in accordancewithFinancialRegulations,thatthe s151Officerhadauthorisedthe write-offofindividualWest DevonBoroughCouncildebtstotalling£96,248.56as detailedinTables1 and2 benoted;and

2.  Thewriteoff ofindividualdebtsinexcessof£5,000totalling

       £5,898.04asdetailedin Table3 be  ...  view the full minutes text for item *HC 5