Agenda item

(Director of Resources) To consider the attached report.

The Chairman noted that this report had been to the District Development Management Committee and to the Governance Select Committee.

Mr Maddock took the Committee through the report on the review and usage of Section 106 monies. The report provided information on the Section 106 process and monitoring arrangements. These monies could be provided for a variety of different purposes and would be based upon requirements identified as part of the planning process. The types of project can range from education, highways, leisure, health and affordable housing provision.

They noted that if a developer was developing land for housing purposes there was a requirement in most cases, where there was a development of 15 or more properties, to provide 40% affordable housing on site. Sometimes however this is not viable and the Council would accept a financial contribution to provide affordable housing in the area. Prior to the house building programme this money was used by the General Fund and passed to housing associations, however this money was currently being used by the HRA.

The Section 106 agreements themselves could vary; most have financial requirements but some had non-financial requirements. Sometimes at the developers behest a repayment clause would be included where the money had to be spent for the agreed purpose within a specific timescale. If this timescale was not met the money becomes repayable and the provider would be entitled to apply for the money to be returned to them. As an example on occasions funding has been provided for highways works and the County Council has struggled to spend the money as no clear project was identified during the planning approval process.

An officer group monitors Section 106 agreements on a quarterly basis, monitoring progress on all agreements ensuring that funds were applied to the appropriate projects and spent within the agreed timescale. There have been 113 Section 106 agreements entered into since 2001and whilst the early ones had been concluded there were still a significant number that had obligations outstanding and some went back a number of years.

As at 31^st March 2016 the Council held £363,000 in various section 106 contributions; this was a considerable reduction on the previous year as all affordable housing monies including those provided during 2015/16 were spent on the Council’s house building programme in that year. The amount was made up of £248,000 related to leisure initiatives and the remaining £115,000 was due and subsequently paid to NHS England or parish council’s.

It was possible that Section 106 agreements would be replaced by the Community Infrastructure Levy or CIL, This was being evaluated as part the Local Plan process by a consultant who was doing the groundwork to assess whether or not we should put a CIL in place, however we will not be able to do this until the Local Plan had been adopted, currently expected by the end of 2018.

The next report was scheduled for the summer of 2017 and would cover the financial year 2016/17. The meeting asked that this report also came to this committee.

Councillor Whitehouse said the issue was if we were practical enough to ask for this money and was there no document we could point to that had scales of payments for suitable developments.

Councillor Kane noted that money had been provided for Highway work but had not always been spent. Members, as ward councillors need to draw up a list of areas where this money could be used.

Councillor Patel said that Parish Councillors needed information on how to ask for S106 money and needed more guidance and communication with them. Councillor Kane said that this was a chicken and egg situation. Parish and Ward councillors needed to develop a hit list on what was needed and make this available to Development Control.

RESOLVED:

That the current position on section 106 funding and any further opportunities be noted.