Agenda item

Councillor Scuplak submits a report that reviews the Council’s existing arrangements for handling developer contributions and to seek agreement to revised policies and procedures designed to improve the Council’s corporate approach in dealing with developer contributions.  Cabinet is asked to approve a number of recommendations set out in paragraph 3.2. of the covering report.

The relevant minute extracts of the Economic Development and Planning Scrutiny Committee on 21 September 2006, the Planning and Development Control Committee on 3 October 2006, and the Housing and Community Safety Scrutiny Committee on 5 October 2006 are attached.

Councillor Scuplak submitted a report that reviewed the Council’s existing arrangements for handling developer contributions and sought agreement to revised policies and procedures designed to improve the Council’s corporate approach in dealing with developer contributions. 

The relevant minute extracts of the Economic Development and Planning Scrutiny Committee on 21 September 2006, the Planning and Development Control Committee on 3 October 2006, and the Housing and Community Safety Scrutiny Committee on 5 October 2006 had been circulated to the Cabinet.

Councillor Scuplak referred to the comments that had been referred to Cabinet by the above committees, reporting that all committees had felt that affordable housing should be given higher priority.  He welcomed the comments but stated that he could not support higher priority being given to affordable housing as it would create a situation where there was no prioritization of factors, and consequently, could lead to developers choosing to develop in cities other than Leicester. 

RESOLVED:

(1)            that the summary of developer contributions as set out in the Planning Obligations Summary detailed at Appendix 2  be approved

(2)that the flowcharts which set out the progresses for handling developer contributions as detailed in Appendix 3 be approved

(3)that the Developer Contributions Guidance for Officers as set out in Appendix 4 be approved

(4)that the terms of reference for a Developer Contributions Officer Group as detailed in Appendix 5 be approved

(5)that the establishment of a post of Developer Contributions Officer with appropriate support as detailed in Appendix 6 be approved; and

(6)            that the summary action plan as set out in Appendix 7 be approved.