Agenda and minutes

Councillors Mason, McCloskey and Hegenbarth had given their apologies.  Councillor Willingham would substitute for Councillor McCloskey and Councillor Holliday would be late.   

Councillor Willingham declared a personal interest in agenda item 5 (Call in of the decision on application for designation of a Neighbourhood Area and Neighbourhood Forum by the Springbank Neighbourhood Forum), as a previous application by the West Cheltenham Forum had included a significant amount of the ward he represents and he had attended a meeting with members of the steering group.

Agree minutes of the last meeting held on 20 January 2017

The minutes of the last meeting had been circulated with the agenda.  The Chairman highlighted that the wrong meeting date had been included on the agenda (20 January rather than 20 February) and noted that there were also exempt minutes of this meeting, which would be circulated for approval with the agenda for the upcoming meeting of the committee (26 June).

Upon a vote it was

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on the 20 February 2017 be agreed and signed as an accurate record.

None had been received.

Consideration of a call-in request regarding a decision made at Cabinet on 16 May 2016

·         Introduction by the Chair

·         Councillor Wendy Flynn to speak on the call-in request

·         Questions to the Cabinet Member Development and Safety, Councillor Andrew McKinlay

·         Questions to the Development Manager, Phil Stephenson and the Director of Planning, Tracey Crews

·         Conclusions and agree recommendations     

The Chairman explained that he had called-in the decision to designate a Neighbourhood Area and Neighbourhood Forum in the current Springbank Ward, following a request from Councillor Wendy Flynn and advice from Officers and Members.  The process for dealing with the call-in was summarised on the agenda and possible options for the committee were set out in paragraph 4.1 of the discussion paper. He invited Councillor Flynn to address the committee. 

Councillor Flynn thanked the Chairman for agreeing to call-in the decision, which she had committed to doing in her letter of objection, were the Springbank application approved.  Whilst she acknowledged that it was the Springbank decision that had been called in, she wished to discuss the West Cheltenham application, which she felt would provide some context to the issue.

Between February and July 2016 the West Cheltenham Forum held four meetings and agreed the group membership, constitution, boundaries and application.  The group used wards as a starting point, namely the four wards of West Cheltenham (St Peters, St Marks, Hester's Way, Springbank and surrounding areas) and finally agreed the boundary which formed part of the application which was submitted in July.  After a six week consultation period in September, there were no objections.  The application was scheduled for determination by Cabinet on the 6 December 2016, with Officers recommending approval, but the decision was deferred as Cabinet had some concerns.  On the 13 December the application went before Cabinet again.   Officers were still recommending approval but had included three options which aimed to address the concerns that had been expressed by Cabinet.  Cabinet rejected the application based on it reducing community cohesion.  Comments made by Cabinet included the fact that only part of the West Cheltenham strategic allocation was included and that the area was too big.  She noted that the Springbank area designation also included part of the strategic allocation and that the decision was at odds with the Cheltenham Masterplan Briefing which considered the four wards in question, as one area with much in common.

The Town and Country Planning Act 1990 states that a council must be satisfied that a Neighbourhood Forum is established with the express purpose of promoting or improving the social, economic and environmental well-being of an area that consists of or includes the neighbourhood area concerned.  Councillor Flynn queried whether this was indeed the case based on the majority of the consultation comments; none of which, with the exception of that from Councillor Jeffries, referenced a neighbourhood plan.  She suggested that members of the Springbank Forum had been entirely drawn from members of the West Cheltenham Greenbelt Group and as consequence, were almost entirely concentrated along the greenbelt area rather than, as prescribed in the regulations, from different places in the neighbourhood area and from different sections of the community in that area.  The report that went to Cabinet on the 16 May stated that “The area proposed to be designated does not include any organisation currently seeking to be designated” but  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

Date of next meeting : 26 June 2017

The next meeting was scheduled for the 26 June.