Appendix A – Recovery and Renewal Actions for SPI Committee

Responding to Increased Demands Arising from COVID-19

 

Action

Resources

Target start and end

Committee and Senior

Responsible Officer

Principles

Planning – Development Control

 

During the pandemic development control workload has increased especially for householder applications; it is difficult to say with confidence that this is a temporary effect but anecdotally this is a response to home improvement and in some cases creating a better home working environment. Fee income doesn’t cover the additional costs. The resource identified here would enable a short-term response to the pressure, if this proves to be a longer term trend in demand it can be identified in the Medium Term Financial Strategy.

 

At the present time, the volume of live planning applications is at least 1/3 higher than in February 2020 (pre-pandemic)

 

£35,000

On approval fixed term position

SPI/WEC

MBC service resilience

Planning Enforcement

 

Request for an additional short-term post until March 2022 as enforcement activity has risen during the pandemic:

 

·      Live enforcement cases in April 2020 standing at 219 and the end of April figures for 2021 standing at 379, an increase of 73% over the April 2020 figures.

 

The resource identified here would enable a short-term response to the pressure, if this proves to be a longer term trend in demand it can be identified in the Medium Term Financial Strategy

 

£35,000

On approval fixed term position

SPI/WEC

MBC service resilience

Planning – Heritage and Landscape

 

 

Proposals are for a Heritage Officer and an Arboriculture Officer for a short fixed term period. This will help address the increase in the volume of work:

 

·         Tree applications have increased by 10% on the previous year (from 236 to 260).  Alongside this, due to the recently identified need for all MBC Tree Preservation Orders to be reported to Planning Committee, case workload has increased significantly.

·         number of 5-day notices have risen from less than 4 per month to 20 per month.

·         Large volume of TPO requests- current backlog is more than 30 (most arising in 2020/21).

·         Large number of customer enquiries.

·         The Heritage Officer would also assist with the Town Centre Strategy workstream, particularly around the Council’s response to increased Permitted Development rights. This work is integral to helping the town centre respond to the various challenges brought about by the pandemic.

 

 

It is unknown whether this is temporary if it continues this will need to be taken account of in the medium term financial strategy.

 

£70,000

On approval fixed term position

SPI/WEC

MBC service resilience

 

Total

 

£140,000