ROCHDALE METROPOLITAN BOROUGH COUNCIL

CABINET MEMBER REPORT TO THE COUNCIL

REPORT OF THE CABINET MEMBER FOR ENVIRONMENT AND LEISURE TO THE MEETING OF THE COUNCIL ON 13 TH OCTOBER 2010

Thank you Mr Mayor for the opportunity to report to the Council the latest developments on various matters relating to the Environment and Leisure Portfolio.

I would like to start my report by paying tribute to Peter Cunningham

Peter started work for the authority 25 years ago in what was the Employment Projects Directorate managing the Community Programme. With the advent of Compulsory Competitive Tendering in 1988 he was appointed GroundCare Services Manager with Direct Services. For the last five years Peter has headed up Environmental Management Services.

Having spoken with Peter I know that he is particularly pleased with the resurgence of the borough’s parks, culminating is seven green flags (plus one for Middleton Cemetery) and the fact that Rochdale was the only authority in the North West to make the Top Ten in the recent vote for the Nation’s Favourite Park competition with not one entry but two, Queens Park winning the competition and Hare Hill Park coming in third place. Under Peter’s stewardship we have also seen recycling rise to 33% and a dramatic increase in the cleanliness of our streets.

I am sure that I speak for everybody at the council when I say that Peter will be sadly missed. He was a role model for other officers in that he was hard-working and cared passionately about what he was doing. I always found him to be a most pleasant, friendly and approachable officer with a good sense of humour and he – and the council – should be pleased with the achievements his conscientious approach produced. Thank –you Peter.

Please find below comments in relation to the Environment side of my portfolio:

Connect2:

Connect2 is a strategic borough wide walking and cycling project made possible by Lottery funding of £450,000 and European rural funds of £200,000. Works were completed in summer 2010 to complete the spine route of the canal towpath from Sladen Bridge in Littleborough, to Castleton. Tenders for the remaining towpath works will be available in October 2010, with construction planned for early 2011. A bridleway link to Heywood, Chadwick Lane, has had a successful experimental surface laid in May 2010, which will be laid on the full length in the next few months.

Chief Executive’s Landscape Award:

The winner of the annual competition between townships was won by Pennines Township for a scheme on Halliwell Street, Milnrow.

Green Flag Accreditation;

As mentioned earlier the authority has gained a total of 8 Green Flag awards. We have retained the seven already received for our parks and added Middleton Cemetery to the Roll of Honour. Queens Park also won the title of The Nations Favourite Park and Hare Hill came in at a credible third. These two parks were the only two parks in the north west in the top ten out of a total on 1264 nationwide. Everybody connected with these achievements should be pround and I congratulate them on their successes.

E.M. Transformation Programme:

Since January this year Environmental Managements front line service sections- Street Services and Waste Services have been implementing phase 1 of the Environmental Management Transformation Programme. This service managed invest to save development has already paid for itself and has seen the introduction of mobile working technology to aid in the efficient utilisation of resources, alongside the use of hand-held devices, more access channels such as the self service portal on the councils website amongst other changes behind the scenes which has led to a reduction in duplication and back office supervisory and administration.

This first phase of the programme which has been put in place the tools to allow the service to continue to drive improved service delivery whilst achieving even further financial efficiencies in the coming years.

Phase 1 alone has already proved invaluable in assisting the service to deliver budget reductions which cam into place this April alone of over £4m in the coming five years. This has been achieved without a reduction in any front line resource.

Waste Update

Regrettably the combined recycling and composting rate for all Greater Authorities now shows a decrease for the first quarter. This is as a result of DEFRA informing the Waste Disposal Authority to retrospectively reclassify green waste sent for shred and spread type applications from composting to recovery as from the 1 st April 2010.

Once this became known, the Waste Disposal Authorities Contractor Viridor Laing acted immediately to review and renegotiate their green waste contracts. As a result from 1 st September there are no longer any “shred and spread” type outlets used and all green waste collected from quarter 3 onwards will be included in the overall recycling rate again.

This policy change has meant that the recycling and composting performance has had to be recalculated to remove any tonnage that may have gone to “shred and spread” type operations during quarters 1 and 2 of this year. The effect on Rochdale’s recycling performance for the 1 st quarter is shown as follows:

Quarter 1 unadjusted NI192 figure – 37.35%

Quarter 1 shred and spread adjusted NI192 figure – 29.79%

This is extremely disappointing and representations have been made to DEFRA on the timing and implications of this retrospective change and the lack of consultation. Any member who wants more information on this and the definition of “shred and spread” please see me and I will arrange for an officer to explain!

PLANNING AND REGULATION

The Local Development Framework Core Strategy now has support from Cabinet and will be presented here tonight for formal endorsement. It is intended to go out to public consultation from the 8 th November. Following a review of consultation comments this will be presented to members for final approval before going on to the Planning Inspectorate for an Examination in Public prior to a final decision.

The Waste Plan has also received Cabinet endorsement. It contains only three proposed sites and all are restricted in the nature of activities proposed to be allowed. The sites are: The area around Mandale Park running up to the where development will be used to rationalise and improve current poor environmental conditions. The Heap Bridge area where development proposals are restricted to small scale activities Rhodes Business Park, again where there will be restrictions on the size and type of development s allowed.

Work is progressing on the development of the Roch Valley Way a footpath, cycleway and bridleway route along the river for its full length throughout the Borough. Over 80% of this route is now confirmed and work is underway to open up considerable lengths in the near future.

Significant progress is being achieved on the remediation of the Boo Hole site where methane gas seepage was causing problems for adjacent homes. The Council secured over £300,000 in grant to undertake this works which should be completed in the next few months.

The Council is part of the Pennine Prospects consortium which recently secured £1.7m from the Heritage Lottery Fund for environmental improvement and interpretation works. Projects within the Borough include The Reservoir Trail around Littleborough. A substantial contribution has also been secured through the Pennine Edge Forest Initiative for the Connect2 programme.

The Planning Service Second Annual Design Awards competition has recently been held. A panel of experts from around the North West unanimously voted the Sixth Form College as the best new building of 2010. A public vote is also being held. In 2009 this attracted over 120 votes from the public and we hope to exceed this figure this year.

LEISURE SERVICES

Neighbourhood and Communities

The Neighbourhood & Communities Team continues to initiate new programmes of delivery within the Borough, as a result of the successful summer programme a number of new initiatives have been introduced.

The team continues to be commissioned to deliver sport and physical activities on behalf of several partner agencies including extended schools service and school sport partnership and is continuing to attract new business for Neighbourhood & Communities programmes of activity and for other services within Link4Life.

Key Actions, Projects, Events, Milestones, Achievements, Good News Stories, Case Studies during period

The delivery of activities to 16–19 years through the 13-19 Activities co-ordinator continues to develop through the introduction of a gym pass for young people attending the 13-19 years Go 4 It clubs. Through joint working within the Neighbourhood & Communities team and Sport & Leisure team 160 passes have been acquired 40 per township for a 6 month period.

The Street Games programme proved extremely successful as a new pilot programme within the Heywood Township. Team Rochdale Borough was represented in rugby league, athletics, basketball, cricket, inline speed skating, skateboarding, angling, tri golf, table tennis, dodgeball, handball, ultimate frisbee, urban orienteering. The borough was the largest represented borough in the North West at the North West Street Games Festival. As a result of the success in the Heywood township the extended schools representatives at Siddal Moor and Woodlands are commissioning the community coaching team to deliver a weekly Street Games session.

The Community Sports Development Officer has secured £12,000 from the Pennines Township and £8500 from the Sport Unlimited programme to deliver 4 Go 4 It Clubs across the borough. The 13-19 years co-ordinator is now progressing this area of work with the clubs due to start in October at Wardle High School, Littleborough Sports Centre, Firgrove Community Centre, Hollingworth Lake Activity Centre, Heywood Sports Village, Springhill Sports Centre, Middleton Arena and Kirkholt Community Gym.

The Go 4 It programme continues to develop across the borough with the 6 existing clubs at Darnhill, Kirkholt, Deeplish, Langley, Belfield, Greave starting again after the holiday period. The 2 new Go 4 It clubs at the Falinge Hub and Wardleworth Community Centre are due to start in September as a result of £6k funding secured from the NHS PCT.

The summer holiday programme raised income of £10k through the community coaching team. The team was commissioned to deliver through a number of bodies such as Middleton Tennis Club, Sandbrook Primary School, Holy Family Primary school, St Mary’s Primary school, Norden Primary School, Rochdale Boroughwide Housing, Siddal Moor and Woodlands Extended School Hubs to deliver the street games programme, Communities for Health for the North West Street Games event. The community coaching team delivered the coaching element of the summer programme at Bowlee Sports Centre, St Mary’s Astro Turf, Littleborough, Springhill, Heywood Sports Village and Middleton Arena.

Heritage and Arts Service

The Schools Programme 2010-11 is proving very popular with 160 workshops booked to date. The Natural History outreach display cases are due for completion this October and will contain, along with the taxidermy animals, recordings of the sounds the creatures make. Complementary resources to accompany the display, aimed at under 5s/KS1, have been sourced and purchased based on information and research from the volunteer under 5s consultant. The display case will be ready for use at the next Family Fun Day on 30 th October.

On Saturday August 14 th we held a music event in the studio in connection with the Feel Good Festival running in the town centre. A well attended performance by students from Falinge Park School added to the event.

The Tourist Information Centre has been shortlisted for a prestigious regional tourism award. North West Development Agency invited a number of North West TIC’s who scored over 95% in their Mystery Shopper exercise earlier this year to submit an entry for the ’s North West Tourism Awards 2010 – TIC of the Year

3 TIC’s from the Greater Manchester area were eligible to go forward for this award including Rochdale.

6 TIC’s from throughout the NW have been shortlisted – Kendal, Morecambe, Preston, Liverpool John Lennon Airport, Appleby and Rochdale.

To qualify for shortlisting we had to submit a 100+ page document.

Assessors looked at:-

Innovative Partnership working in making the best use of resources and offering value for money services. The range of services offered – over and above the traditional range of leaflets, information and sale of souvenirs. Customer Service – including professionalism and commitment to the customer. Investment in staff training and development. Sustainability

Staff will find out if they are successful at the England’s North West Tourism Award’s Dinner at Lancashire Cricket Club, Old Trafford – 29 th September 2010.

Sports and Leisure

The Capital programme is progressing. Heywood Sports village has now opened with a very successful launch weekend on the 18 th /19 th September respectively. Over 2,000 people attended the weekend which proved to be a tremendous success.

The Summer Programme proved to be a complete success across all sites. From receiving the initial funding to the excellent delivery provided the centre enjoyed a busy summer. As well as all the children who enjoyed the centre’s programme, we also hosted Sunsport each week which allowed lots of young disabled people to take part in a varied range of activities. At Bowlee the summer activities achieved 90% capacity and over 3,000 young people took part in activity.

On 1st of September Springhill Sports Centre will change its name from Springhill Sports Centre to Kingsway Park Sports Centre. This is because the School (Part of the BSF Project) will be undergoing huge changes in the next year culminating in a brand new School being built on site.

Bowlee Park Community School have funded 3 x 10 week after School activities starting in September totally £700 worth of sponsorship; again emphasising the partnership between L4L and the school.

As expected the removal of free swimming for under 16s and over 60s has had an effect on the number of users attending public swimming sessions at all sites.

Councillor David Clayton

Thank you Mr Mayor, I will be pleased to answer any questions from Members of the Council about these or any other matter relating to the Environment and Leisure Portfolio.

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