Agenda and minutes

At this point, members are asked to declare any personal or prejudicial interests they may have in the business on this agenda.

Members were invited to declare at this point in the meeting any personal or prejudicial interests they might have in the business on the agenda.

No interests were declared.

To approve and sign the minutes of the meeting of the Urgency Committee held on 23 May 2007.

RESOLVED:             That the minutes of the meeting of the Urgency Committee held on 23 May 2007 be approved and signed by the Chair as a correct record.

At this point in the meeting members of the public who have registered their wish to speak regarding an item on the agenda or an issue within the Committee’s remit can do so.  The deadline for registering is Monday 25 June 2007, at 5.00 pm.

It was reported that there had been no registrations to speak at the meeting under the Council’s Public Participation Scheme.

This report seeks Members views on evening parking charges following the approval of the Policy Prospectus by the Executive on 12 June 2007.

Members received a report which sought their views on evening parking charges following the approval of the Policy Prospectus by the Executive on 12 June 2007.  A decision on the issue was considered to be urgent owing to the perceived impact of evening parking charges on York’s evening economy.

An evening parking survey had been carried out to assess the claims that the imposition of evening parking charges had damaged the evening economy.  The results suggested that there may be some impact around the Parliament Street area but elsewhere the situation seemed to suggest that customers were not being deterred by the charges.

The report presented the following options for consideration:

·  Option A – to remove evening charges completely;

·  Option B – to modify the charges for both residents and non-residents;

·  Option C – to allow Minster badge holders to park free of charge.

The report explained that any changes to the charges could not be implemented immediately as tariff boards and ticket machine software would need to be amended and the controlling Traffic Regulation Order would need to be modified.

The expected loss of revenue from the introduction of free evening parking for residents in 2007/08 was estimated to be £55,000. Given that the Council had a gross income budget of £6,200k it was considered that the reduced income from this proposal could be contained within the parking budgets.  In a full year the cost would be £75,000 and it would therefore be necessary to address this ongoing cost through the 2008/09 budget process.  The cost of changing signage of up to £10,000 would be met from existing budgets established for this purpose.

Some Members expressed concern regarding the methodology used in the survey, both in terms of not being able to establish the effect of charges specifically on residents and in terms of it not looking at those people who had ceased to use the car parks.  Other Members noted that the same methodology had been used for a survey in 2004, prior to the introduction of the charges, and therefore the results could be directly compared. 

Some Members expressed the view that removal of evening charges for residents would help to revitalise the evening economy and others highlighted the need to monitor if there was an upturn in business if charges were abolished.  

Advice of the Urgency Committee

That the Executive Leader be advised:

(i)         That Minster badge holders be allowed to park free of charge in the evening.

Decision of the Executive Leader

RESOLVED:             That the advice of the Urgency Committee be accepted and endorsed.

REASON:                  As requested in the Policy Prospectus.

This report asks Members to approve a pay supplement for an Assistant Director (AD) post within Learning, Culture and Children’s Services, pending a wider review of AD salaries.

Members received a report which asked them to approve a pay supplement for an Assistant Director (AD) post within Learning, Culture and Children’s Services (LCCS), pending a wider review of AD salaries.  The report had been brought to an Urgency Committee because of the need to fill the post of Assistant Director (School Improvement & Staff Development) in LCCS, following the decision of the current post holder to retire, and the inability to fill the post, having already failed on one attempt to recruit at the current salary.

The report presented three options for consideration:

·  Option 1 – to pay the pay supplement as a ‘market supplement’ in addition to basic pay;

·  Option 2- to pay the pay supplement in addition to basic pay based on performance in the post;

·  Option 3 – to consolidate the pay supplement into the basic pay for the post.

Some Members expressed concern that agreement of a market supplement would set a precedent for other similar posts and officers advised that any further requests would need to go through a similar approval process.

Members also expressed concern that there was no comparator information available on similar posts in other organisations and requested that the item be deferred to another Urgency Committee meeting to allow for this information to be provided.

RESOLVED:(i) That the report be deferred to a further Urgency Committee meeting.

REASON:To allow the provision of comparator information.