This week and other stuff

A groundbreaking meeting occurred a few days ago bringing contact to all three Community Safety Partnerships, that is Dorset Bournemouth and Poole, and the Criminal Justice Board. The purpose was to bring some continuity and synergy to the process of crime and disorder reduction with special concentration on victim priority and the judiciary including probation. Considerable progress was made in linking the roles of Councillors who have a responsibility for reductions in crime events in their wards and most importantly a responsibility to reduce reoffending with special attention to youth crime, with the processes of restorative justice. Following a very open and candid discussion it was agreed that discussions should continue and be linked to the CSP agendas. For me it was further evidence that the bottom up democratic driven process linked to the role of the elected Police and Crime Commissioners role was beginning to get credibility. So onto other events including the Resources committee on Wednesday evening or should I say night, the huge agenda included the Committees reaction to the COC parking ideas which I had some sympathy for. Although the COC had presented an excellent case Officers were minded not to take the risk at this time to so radically change the charging regime basically because of the stats which showed that of the numbers of cars paying 80pence represented some 70% of drivers parking for up to two hours and that they would be disadvantaged. I am still minded to explore this further perhaps with more empirical evidence, but democracy prevailed and the decision not to change the current system carried. That is apart from the night time charge of £I after 7pm until 8.0am in centre car parks. The balanced budget was also agreed and recommended to full Council and will be heard on the 26th of this month. This includes an increase in CBC Council tax of 1.95% which means just over £3 per year on a band D house rate. It doesn't sound much but across the Borough it means that we can partially mitigate against the effects of inflation in our drive for sustainability. In short it means a little now will prevent a big increase later, it is also within Government parameters. I was delighted to see also the dialogue between Officers, town centre Councillors and a co-ordinated group of residents regarding their objective of providing a new Druitt centre. I certainly wish them well and have been supportive to Councillors and officers to see that this impasse is resolved. I understand a joint press release has been issued and will be interested to see how our local press report this progress. On a different subject CBC has just completed a Peer Group Challenge whereby a group of highly experienced local government officers and members with considerable experience and skills spend four days looking at what we do at CBC and how we do it. Their report is now in, it is comprehensive and deals with our chosen core corporate objective of 'growth', how we can deliver it and what the consequences will be, and how we should/could change in our approach to ensure delivery. It is going to be my weekend reading!