Resolved
(1) That the following achievements be noted:
Cherwell: A District of Opportunity
· Support vulnerable residents, focussing on homelessness prevention & housing advice is reporting as Green*. We have maintained good performance in delivering homeless prevention focused services. In this quarter the Housing Needs Team opened 233 prevention cases, of these, 101 only required advice, 11 did become homeless and 116 were prevented from becoming homeless through casework intervention. In the period a total of 31 homeless applications were taken and 10 full duties accepted. This represents only 13% of those approaching the Housing Needs Team stating they are in housing crisis.
· Number of households living in temporary accommodation is reporting as Green*. At the end of December 13 there were 28 Households in Temporary Accommodation, the number has gone down mainly as a result of being able to successfully discharge our duties and enable applicants to move on to secure settled accommodation, whilst keeping the numbers of those presenting for homeless duties low due to the continued focus on homeless prevention.
· Processing of major applications within 13 weeks (%) is reporting as Green*. The improvement measures have resulted in a sustained increase in performance this year to date. Quarter 3 performance of 80% represents a significant improvement on historic performance.
· Processing of minor applications within 8 weeks is reporting as Green. Performance this quarter has continued to show improvement, following the action taken during the previous quarter improved. As anticipated, the backlog in registration took some time to take effect, but the improvement is now expected to be maintained. This reported as Amber last quarter.
· Average time taken to process new Housing Benefit Claims (days) is reporting as Green. A further improvement reflecting the fact that the backlog from summer has been cleared. Performance year to date: 16.74.This reported as Amber last quarter.
· Protect and enhance the quality of the built environment by completion of Conservation Area Reviews and strong design guidance for all new developments is reporting as Green. The issues reported in the last quarter have now largely been resolved. A new conservation officer has been recruited, who is proving to be a real asset to the team. The level of pre application advice and planning and listed building applications being managed by the team is very high at the moment, which has led to some of the strategic, longer term projects taking longer than initially planned. Conservation Area Appraisals are on target and there are four appraisals and management plans which are very close to being published and should be signed off in the next month. This reported as Amber last quarter.
· % houses developed on previously developed land is reporting as Green*. 34 of the 74 houses completed in Quarter 3 were on previously developed land. This brings the number to 103 out of 275 year to date. This reported as Red last quarter.
A Cleaner Greener Cherwell
· Work with partners to improve the energy efficiency of homes & enable more residents to achieve affordable energy bills is reporting as Green. Work to engage with the Cherwell public included :- reprinting and distributing the leaflet on how to reduce energy wastage at home and save money; roadshows to engage with residents directly as part of the Christmas lights events in Kidlington, Banbury and Bicester; funding application for heat district network (DECC) to explore the feasibility of using the heat from the energy generated from waste at the Ardley plan; setting up a working group for solar community pv scheme by approaching businesses in Bicester to have solar panels installed and to use the feed in tariff for further retrofit /energy saving work with Bicester residents.
· Work with partners to progress the delivery of the Masterplan for Bicester is reporting as Green. The Masterplan is making considerable progress and is on track for the initial presentation of the plan to CDC for end Quarter 1, 2014/15. There remain some issue such as traffic modelling that are yet to be completed and could impact on timescales for completion of the masterplan.
A Safe, Healthy and Thriving District
· Number of risk based food premises inspections completed is reporting as Amber. The team remain on target to finish at 100% despite lower than anticipated figures for Quarter 3. This was due in part to a number of food poisoning outbreaks and food alerts from the Foods Standard Agency Year to date performance 458 against target of 436. This had reported as Red last quarter.
· % nuisance cases responded to within the prescribed period (a maximum of 48 hours) is reporting as Green. During the quarter 250 service requests were responded to within the time frame out of 251 received
An Accessible Value for Money Council
· Improve levels of satisfaction with and access to information provided by the Council is reporting as Green. Engagement via social media continues to increase with Facebook likes up almost 1.5k on the last quarter to 2223. Twitter followers have also increased to 4173. Additional services have been made available online and URL's are being changed to ensure they are 'friendly' and more customer focussed.
· Deliver a council tax increase in 2014/15 which is below inflation is reporting as Green. The Council tax increase will be set in February but will be below inflation at 0%
(2) That the following performance related matters be identified for review or consideration in future reports:
Cherwell: A District of Opportunity
· Deliver 500 new homes including through planned major housing projects is reporting as Red. House building in the district has been slow due to the recent market conditions therefore it is possible that the end of year target would not be met. However the Council had released a number of large strategic sites in 2013 which have either received planning permission or resolution to approve, with a view to improving delivery. These sites include: Land east and west of Southam Road, North of Hanwell Fields and West of Bretch Hill. Work has also commenced on the Bankside site at Banbury, and other sites in the rural areas such as Arncott and Milcombe are well underway.
A Cleaner, Greener District
· Tonnage of waste sent to landfill is reporting as Amber. The amount of residual waste sent to landfill is above target. Total waste sent to landfill this year to-date is 19,326 tonnes against a target of 17,700. At the same time last year 18,304 tonnes had been sent to landfill. The Environment Agency introduced changes last year which requires street sweepings to be landfilled whereas previously they were recycled. Discussions are being held with Oxfordshire County Council to seek alternative arrangements for these to be recycled. Note: December figures are provisional.
· Number of flytips is reporting as Amber. There has been a small rise in flytipping following a small fall last year. Comparable year to date figure for 2011/12 was 272. This was reporting as Red last quarter.
A Safe, Healthy & Thriving District.
· Reduce domestic burglary incidents reported by 2% (per 1000 Popn.) is reporting as Red. December tends to be the turning point in all crime and therefore a reduction in burglary is anticipated during next quarter.
An Accessible Value for Money Council
· Car parking revenue (Cash machines & Ringgo) is reporting as Red. Quarter 3 saw a further reduction in car park income. This is in the main due to income reduction from operating a reduced number of car parks in Bicester and the opening of Sainsbury’s, a greater impact than was initially projected.
· Sickness absence - Average days sickness absence per FTE – we are unable to report this quarter due to changes in the Payroll system and not being able to run reports at this time. We will report on Quarter 3 and Quarter 4 together.
(3) That progress on issues raised in the Quarter two performance report be noted.