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.

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

Councillor D’Agorne declared a personal non-prejudicial interest in agenda item 4 (York Central Area Action Plan: Issues and Options) as a member of the Cyclists’ Touring Club and a member of the York Open Planning Forum.

Councillor Macdonald declared a personal non-prejudicial interest in agenda item 4 (York Central Area Action Plan: Issues and Options) as an employee of the rail transport industry.

Councillor Merrett declared a personal non-prejudicial interest in agenda item 4 (York Central Area Action Plan: Issues and Options) as an employee of the rail transport industry, an honorary member of the Cyclists’ Touring Club, a member of Cycling England and as his daughter attended St Paul’s School.

Councillor Simpson-Laing declared a personal non-prejudicial interest in agenda item 4 (York Central Area Action Plan: Issues and Options) as a resident of Leeman Road, as her daughter attended Poppleton Road School and as her father worked for Network Rail.

Councillor Waller declared a personal non-prejudicial interest in agenda item 4 (York Central Area Action Plan: Issues and Options) as City of York Council’s representative on the Yorkshire Regional Flood Defence Committee.

To approve and sign the minutes of the meeting of the Local Development Framework Working Group held on 16 January 2006.

RESOLVED:That the Minutes of the Local Development Framework Working Group meeting held on 16 January 2006 be approved and signed by the Chair as a correct record, with the following amendment:

                        (i) To minute 14 (City of York Local Development Framework – Core Strategy) to record the comment that the trade off between the amount of housing and the amount of economic growth should be clearly articulated in the Issues and Options document.

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 remit of the Working Group, may do so.  The deadline for registering is 10 am on Friday 28 July 2006.

It was reported that there had been one registration to speak under the Council’s Public Participation Scheme.

Janet O’Neill addressed the meeting regarding the Local Development Framework Core Strategy Issues and Options document.  She outlined concerns that the city strategy, set out in chapter 4 of this document, was not strong enough and requested that officers review and clarify this section as part of their work following the consultation process.

It was confirmed that these comments had also been submitted in writing during the consultation process and officers were asked to circulate them to Members for information.

Officers confirmed that the results of the consultation exercise would be reported to Members in the autumn and that the issues raised by the speaker could be considered at that point.

This report outlines progress with the preparation of the Issues and Options document for the York Central Area Action Plan (AAP) and seeks Member’s views on the structure and key issues to address in the emerging Issues and Options document, the draft Sustainability Appraisal Scoping report and the emerging draft Community Consultation Strategy.

Members received a report which outlined progress with the preparation of the Issues and Options document for the York Central Area Action Plan (AAP) and sought their views on the structure and key issues to address in the emerging Issues and Options document, the draft Sustainability Appraisal Scoping report and the emerging draft Community Consultation Strategy.

A draft structure for the Issues and Options document was attached as Annex 1 of the report.  This outlined the proposed framework for preparation of the document, which would:

·  Set the context for the Area Action Plan process;

·  Summarise the baseline information which had guided the preparation of the Issues and Options document;

·  Set the strategic context and sustainability objectives for York Central, including the draft vision for the area;

·  Identify the key constraints and a number of key topics which needed to be addressed in developing issues and options for the York Central area;

·  Identify a number of indicative options for comment.

The Sustainability Appraisal (SA) process was a way of ensuring that all plans and policies with land use implications took into account the social, economic and resource use issues that determined whether a development would be sustainable.  The first stage in the sustainability appraisal process was the preparation of an SA Scoping Report.  This described the methodology and scope for the sustainability appraisal work to be carried out on the Area Action Plan.  It would be used to test the implications and consequences of the issues and options being developed.  The draft SA Scoping Report was attached as Annex 3 of the report.  Consultation was currently being undertaken on the Scoping Report and the results of this exercise would be considered at the next meeting of the Working Group.

A draft Community Consultation Strategy was attached as Annex 2 of the report.  This set out the proposed consultation approach for the Issues and Options document, which would result in qualitative (perceptions and views) and quantitative (facts and figures) outcomes and outputs.  Consultation would include getting the community’s views on both the strategy itself and later on the actual Issues and Options being developed.  It was proposed to gain feedback on the draft consultation strategy from a range of key stakeholders to test the indicative programming during next month, prior to the preparation of the final strategy.

Members received a presentation on the draft Community Consultation Strategy from Social Regeneration Consultants (SRC), who had been appointed to carry out the consultation relating to the Issues and Options stage of the Area Action Plan.  A summary of this presentation was circulated to Members.

Members then made detailed comments on each of the attached documents, as set out in Appendices 1-3 of the minutes.

RECOMMENDED:(i)That the comments on the emerging York Central Area Action Plan Issues and Options document, detailed in Appendix 1 of the minutes, be agreed and incorporated into a revised document;

(ii)That the comments on the consultation draft Sustainability Appraisal Scoping Report, detailed in Appendix 2 of the minutes,  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.