Agenda item
LUF Project and Other Funding Submission Updates
Report attached.
Minutes:
The Cabinet considered a report ofCouncillor Mohammed Younis, Portfolio Holder for Levelling Up, which provided an update on recent progress with the LUF funded Accrington Town Square projects and confirmation of the recent success with regards to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) Long-Term Plan for Towns (LTPT), High Street Accelerators Pilot Programme (HSAP) and National Lottery Heritage Funding (NLHF) submissions.
Councillor Younis introduced the report and outlined the latest position. The Market Hall decant was around 90% complete. Some concerns had been raised about rain water ingress to the cabins and a possible solution was being considered. Overall, traders were satisfied and some good news stories had emerged. For example, the pet stall had reported significantly increase trade since moving into the cabin and the bakery shop had reported that it was doing well and would switch from opening 3 days per week to 6 days per week. Councillor Younis thanked all those who were working to make the project successful. Some minor issues had been identified and these were currently being addressed. The cabins would be fully open soon and a celebratory event was due to be held.
Work to remove the pavilions on Peel Street was due to start in the next few weeks and work inside the Market Hall would also commence shortly. The start of these works would be a major milestone in the transformation of the Market Hall.
A useful meeting had taken place recently about the creation of a dedicated space for the flea-market traders who operated on Thursdays and Sundays. It was important not to lose this trade. A solution was close to being identified.
The projects at Burtons Chambers and Market Chambers were also progressing well. The use of the compulsory purchase order (CPO) powers might ultimately be required, but negotiations were still on-going with a view to reaching an agreement with the relevant freehold and leasdholders.
The Chair reported that he was due to attend a site visit on Broadway tomorrow to view a selection of pop-up stalls, which could be used by the flea-market traders. The flea-market helped to maintain footfall on Thursdays and Sundays, which benefitted other town centre businesses.
Approval of the report was not considered to be a key decision.
Reasons for Decision
LUF Funded Projects
Cabinet had received regular updates on progress of the Accrington Town Square projects and this report provided a brief update on progress to date. The Council had created a dedicated Accrington Town Square website where all relevant information about the projects, latest news and documents were available to view. Key recent outcomes to note were:
- Submission of all planning applications for Burtons Chambers, Market Chambers, the Market Hall / Trader Decant and listed building consent for the Market Hall. At the time of writing this report, planning permission had been approved for Burtons Chambers and the Market Trader Decant. The remaining applications were due to be determined in February and March 2024.
- Appointment of Delivery Partner – Morgan Sindall had initially been appointed to undertake the enabling works, which included liaising with the existing project team on the relocation of the market traders to the new temporary market on the town square, although the contractual arrangements gave the Council the ability to extend the scope of their appointment subject to satisfactory performance.
- Procurement of operators for both Burtons Chambers and the Market Hall commenced and identification of a preferred operator was likely to be March for the Burtons Chambers and May for the Market Hall, with signing of the legal agreements following afterwards.
- Nineteen temporary market trader cabins had been erected on the town square and traders had been relocating in groups. There were two other traders and two businesses who were decanting into other Council owned properties in the town centre. These properties required some remodelling works, which was likely to be completed in March, along with some improvement works needed to reopen the toilets on Peel Street whilst the Market Hall was closed.
- Plans were being drawn up to allow for a small number of casual traders to utilise gazebos erected along Broadway. All existing businesses along Broadway had been consulted and raised no objections.
- Property acquisitions continued to progress, with the Council likely to achieve the fourth freehold interest and vacant possession of a ground floor unit in Market Chambers during February. Discussions were continuing with the other leaseholders in Market Chambers and the remaining tenant in Burtons Chambers, who had identified their preferred relocation property within the town centre and was in discussions with the owner.
- The fifth and final freeholder in Market Chamber had now engaged with the Council’s property acquisition consultant.
- The Council continued to progress a CPO on both Burtons Chambers and Market Chambers, as an alternative way forward if sale by agreement and vacant possession / surrender of lease by agreement could not be achieved within the project timescale.
- Plans were in place for a ‘Getting Connected’ event with Morgan Sindall, the main contractor, for Friday 8th March 1pm-3pm in Accrington Town Hall. (A leaflet/poster was provided as an Appendix to the report).
Long-Term Plan for Towns funding (LTPT)
On the 18th December 2023, the Government had announced 55 towns, (which included Accrington) would each receive funding and support as part of a £1.1 billion levelling up investment to enable towns to develop their long-term plan.
The LTPT funding would ensure local people could develop plans that delivered their community priorities and were given the tools to change their town’s long-term future. The published guidance set out that the 55 towns would:
- receive up to £20 million of endowment-style funding?and support for local people’s priorities, like regenerating local high streets and town centres, or securing public safety, over a 10 year period;
- be required to set up a Town Board by 1st April 2024 which would bring together community leaders, employers, local authorities and the local MP who would develop and deliver the Long-Term Plan for their town following consultation with local people; and
- make use of a suite of new regeneration powers and interventions currently progressing through the legislative process to boost pride and unlock private sector investment, for example, by auctioning empty high street shops, creating and maintaining parks/green spaces and / or improving heritage sites.
The Government had also confirmed £13.75 million of additional capacity funding for each of the benefiting local authorities. An initial £50k had immediately been made available and a further £200k would be paid once the appointment of an Independent Chair and Town Board was in place to begin community engagement. The published guidance required the new Town Board to develop and submit its long term plan by 1st August 2024 at the latest.
The published guidance also confirmed that the Town Board should be led by an independent chair, who would act as a champion for the town. The chair could be anyone who held a prominent role in the community, such as heads of charities, education establishments or football clubs and who would provide leadership to ensure the Town Board was community-led and embedded within the local area.
The Town Board would have to include the relevant local MP, alongside a senior representative from the police. Other members should be respected local figures with an obvious passion for their area and could be drawn from community partners such as local businesses/property owners, health, cultural, arts, heritage and sporting/leisure organisations. In order to successfully deliver the funding requirements a project team with the following skills will be required:
- Communications, consultation and engagement;
- Regeneration and place making;
- Economic advisory;
- Procurement; and
- Programme management.
In addition, wider design and project team services would be required to support the review and development of the existing TCIP into a long term plan for areas such as town centre master planning and programme management.
High Street Accelerators Pilot Programme (HSAP)
In March 2023, the Government had published its Anti-Social Behaviour Action Plan, setting out an ambitious new approach to working with local agencies to tackle the blight of anti-social behaviour facing communities across England and Wales. The action plan recognised that significant levels of vacancy on the high street could make people feel unsafe and that, as our town centres continue to transform following the growth of online shopping, it would require leadership from the public, private and third sector to make sure our high streets regenerated successfully, and in a way that appealed to the people living, working, and visiting the area.
As part of this action plan, the Government had committed up to £2.5 million of funding to launch the High Street Accelerators in 10 pilot areas across the Country. The objective of the High Street Accelerators Pilot Programme was for local stakeholders to work in partnership to empower and incentivise residents, businesses, community groups and other stakeholders to work together with the local authority to develop and deliver a long-term vision to revive and regenerate the high street. The published guidance set out that each pilot authority:
- would receive £237,000 revenue funding split between 2023/24 and 2024/25 until March 2025, with funding available from the date the specific high street was agreed and grant agreements were put in place; and
- could submit an Expression of Interest (EOI) for additional funding to build parklets and green spaces on their high street by 1st March 2024. This additional funding was part of the Anti-Social Behaviour Action Plan announced investment in green spaces which would allocate up to £5 million between the 10 pilot authorities.
At the launch event on 6th December, the 10 pilot areas participating had been informed of the following mandatory elements:
- they must to form a partnership with a precise geographical boundary, develop a vision and a financial plan for the partnership, and identify and start to deliver projects to revive and regenerate the high street; and
- the new partnership must include representatives from the local authority, business, community, and property owners. The partnership was required to invite the Member of Parliament representing the area to be involved in some way – potentially in a consultative capacity. Although not mandatory, it was encouraged that additional partners be involved in the partnership, although these partners might vary depending on the characteristics of the area; and
- the Chair must be a non-Local Authority person; and
- the partnership must develop a terms of reference, governance structure, and meet regularly; and
- the partnership must have a project delivery plan and clear plans for the monitoring and evaluation of progress and results and the partnership was strongly recommended to use Key Performance Indicators to evaluate its work.
The Council had reached out to Peter Holden (President of the Great Harwood Civic Society and Secretary of the Great Harwood Community Action Group) who had agreed to be the independent chair of the new partnership. With his agreement, the Council had also reached out to representatives from four local businesses, a youth organisation, two community groups, two local councillors and the Cabinet Member for Levelling Up. Further discussions were ongoing to secure a representative from the Police and health sector.
The first meeting of the new partnership had been held on 22nd January in Bank Mill House Community Centre and further meetings had been planned during February.
National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF)
Whilst the Council was acquiring the Market Chambers building and undertaking external façade restoration and roof repairs through the LUF funding, at its meeting on 21st June 2023, Cabinet had approved a £5m funding bid submission to the National Lottery Heritage Fund. This application had been submitted on Wednesday 16th August 2023 to transform the internal space of the building into a heritage, culture and arts space.
On 29th November 2023, the Council had been informed it had been successful and would receive development stage funding to the value of £463k, with an agreement that a further £370k of match funding would be provided by the Council. This development stage would last for approximately 15 months and required the Council to undertake community engagement, develop the designs and project costs further, and to submit a Delivery Stage submission by a deadline date of 30th November 2025. If the Council was successful with its submission, it would then unlock the remaining circa £4.5m NLHF funding to undertake the capital and revenue element of the project.
Procurement / Appointment of Consultants
With the Council’s externally funded town centre square projects progressing in parallel, there was limited capacity within the existing project management team’s structure and additional resource would be required to deliver the other projects referred to above.
Due to the extremely tight timescales involved with the three funders highlighted in the report, many principles of the existing procurement strategy developed for the Levelling Up funded Accrington Town Square projects, (agreed by Cabinet in July 2022) were appropriate for the other projects. This included the recommendation that frameworks were likely to be the route that was most suitable for procuring the project teams, some examples being the use of SCAPE, NHS SBS, CCS, etc. The frameworks, (direct appointment and/or mini tender appointment) would be carefully considered for each consultant procurement to ensure the most appropriate framework or Dynamic Purchasing System for that particular work requirement was selected, whilst giving due consideration to achieving value for money, project continuity and deliverability within the required timescales.
Alternative Options considered and Reasons for Rejection
The Council could choose not to use existing Government compliant frameworks and simply operate open tenders. This had been discounted due to the tight deadlines set by the funders and need to appoint resources and commence work quickly.
Resolved - That Cabinet:
(1) Notes the recent progress on the LUF projects.
(2) Acknowledges the recent funding announcements and grants delegated authority to the Executive Director (Environment), following consultation with the Executive Director of Finance (Section 151 Officer) and Executive Director (Legal & Democratic Services) to accept in accordance with the relevant terms and conditions of each of the following funders:
• Long-Term Plan for Towns - £20m over a 10 year period, plus £250k revenue capacity funding split over 2023/24 & 2024/25, for Accrington Town Centre;
• High Street Accelerator Pilot - £237k revenue funding split over 2023/24 & 2024/25, plus the potential for an additional £500k of capital funding for 2024/25, for Great Harwood;
• National Lottery Heritage Fund - £463k revenue funding split over 2023/24 and 2024/25 for Accrington Market Chambers.
(3) Approves expenditure of the LTPT, HSAP and NLHF funding and grants delegated authority to the Executive Director (Environment) to take all reasonable steps to deliver each of the funders required project outcomes, subject to the financial amounts highlighted in paragraphs 3.2.2, 3.2.3, 3.3.2 and 3.4.2 of the report.
(4) Agrees that due to the extremely tight deadlines required by the funding agreements for each of these funding streams, the procurement strategy previously agreed to deliver the LUF funded Accrington Town Centre projects is applied to the HSAP, LTPT and NLHF funded projects.
Councillors Zak Khan and Mohamed Younis, having previously declared a disclosable pecuniary interest in the following Item, left the meeting and did not take part in the debate or vote upon the matter.
Supporting documents:
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LUF Project and Other Funding Updates - Main Report, item 307.
PDF 259 KB
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Appendix 1 - Getting Connected Event, item 307.
PDF 2 MB