Agenda and draft minutes

There were none received.

The Chair will consider the admission of any late items of business. Where the item is already included on the agenda, it will appear under that item, but new items of urgent business will be dealt with at item xxx.

There was none.

To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on 5 December 2007.

The minutes of the meeting held on 5 December were confirmed as a correct record. Details of schemes that had brought in regeneration resources to be provided to the Panel.  Also Members expressed a wish to visit projects in Haringey and other Borough’s Neighbourhood Management Services.

A member with a personal interest in a matter who attends a meeting of the authority at which the matter is considered must disclose to that meeting the existence and nature of that interest at the commencement of that consideration, or when the interest becomes apparent.

A member with a personal interest in a matter also has a prejudicial interest in that matter if the interest is one which a member of the public with knowledge of the relevant facts would reasonably regard as so significant that it is likely to prejudice the member's judgment of the public interest and if this interest affects their financial position or the financial position of a person or body as described in paragraph 8 of the Code of Conduct and/or if it relates to the determining of any approval, consent, licence, permission or registration in relation to them or any person or body described in paragraph 8 of the Code of Conduct

There was none.

To consider the views of

a)     Safer Neighbourhoods

b)     Director of Urban Environment

c)      Director of Children and Young People

d)     Assistant Director–Policy,Performance,Partnership and Communication

The Panel received and noted details of presentations as follows:

Safer Neighbourhoods

There were involved in Area Based working, bringing local partners together to look at crime, disorder and environmental problems, issues that fell across several agencies. In order to evaluate the work a trial had been undertaken whereby partners worked towards joint priorities and an evidence base line was set. Priorities were set every six months based on a combination of residents’ perceptions and intelligience on the ground. This priority setting had been rolled out to Bruce Grove and West Green and in March the trial was being extended to Woodside, Noel Park and Bounds Green.

Neighbourhood Managers were involved in chairing the Area based meetings. Although working relations with Neighbourhood Management were good, some areas were better than others. Consequently there was a need to develop proper structures and processes to work towards priorities. The Head of Partnerships explained that the role of Neighbourhood Management was to co-ordinate and facilitate arrangements. Overall priorities came from the Strategic Assessment data which was a national requirement for Crime and Disorder, although there was local priority setting through the community safety strategy which was reviewed every three years.

Urban Environment

Area based working had been piloted in four areas since January 2006.The key objectives were to improve services and to find synologies to increase residents satisfaction.  Although it had worked well in identifying and dealing with local issues and had strengthened partnerships, it had also highlighted the need for more and better based performance data and it needed to be embedded into business planning and performance management. Also the potential to jointly prioritise and task across teams was not sufficiently developed A key change was the re-shaping and delivery of front line services with services being shaped to meet users’ needs not department functions. From April 2008 two Area based action teams Enforcement and Street scene would be merged. The service was working through Area action plans which had to be linked to community leadership.  Commissioning and procurement of front line services would be in force by the end of 2009. There was a need for more quality area based data.

 Neighbourhood Management played a role in terms of identifying local priorities. However there a need for a change to the organisation’s structure and governance, behaviour and accountability and people’s perceptions of working in communities. Whilst accountability, resources  and operational responsibility for projects rested with the service, Neighbourhood Management  had a key role to play as a facilitator for community engagement and participation. The Assistant Director advised that a report being prepared on links with Neighbourhood Management would be available to fed into this review. Also Neighbourhood Management had a role to play in  co-ordinating multi agency working to solve complex issues.

For the future whilst evidence based Local Area Agreement targets  would set the priorities, there was a need  to ensure that there was better use of local intelligence to co-ordinate resources with Neighbourhood Management being engaged in building communities  ...  view the full minutes text for item 11.

To consider any new items of business admitted at item 2 above.

There was no new items of urgent business.