Environment Policy and Review Panel - Tuesday, 23rd January, 2018 7.00 pm - Agenda and minutes

To confirm the Minutes of the Meeting held on 5th September and the Joint Meeting held on 7th November (copies attached).

The Minutes of the Meeting held on 5th September and the Joint Meeting with the Leisure and Youth Panel held on 7th November were approved and signed by the Chairman.

To receive information from Robert Noble and Jason Kinsella from Serco on the performance levels, customer satisfaction, new initiatives and challenges during the first six months of the contract delivery (paper attached).

Robert Noble and Jason Kinsella from Serco attended the meeting and advised the Panel on the Serco performance during the first six months of the contract delivery.  The contract commenced on 31st July, 2017 and all 82 members of staff from the previous contractor had been TUPE’d over to Serco.  The transition had been made easier due to the partnership working between Serco and the Council.

There had been no major changes to the grounds service due to the excellent standards that were already being achieved.  The service had been supplemented with an edging programme.  The edging programme would be a continual rolling programme carried out across the Borough.  Environmental improvements had been introduced to the provision of toilets in the Borough and Serco promoted the most eco-friendly cleaning chemicals available on the market.  The driving from site to site was now completed in a state-of-the-art fully electric van.  The Whitespace hand-held devices also cut down travelling time by sending new jobs directly to the crew. 

The Serco street cleansing strategy committed to provide residents with a simple, efficient and visible streets service throughout the Borough based on a two phased approach of manual sweeping/litter clearance operation and mechanical cleansing.  Serco had taken a more neighbourhood area approach which included a barrow sweeping beat in Aldershot, Farnborough and North Camp Town Centres and ten further barrow sweeping beats across the rest of the Borough operating on a 20-day cleansing cycle.  There was also a large mechanical broom and two smaller mechanical brooms to support the barrow sweeping.  Feedback received on street cleansing had been positive with compliments on the standard of detritus removed and visibility of staff.  The litter picking, sweeping and weed removal had been time consuming and intensive.  The team had identified that litter had built up due to the time spent in detail cleansing.  As a result the cleansing schedules had been revised to enable the ten barrow beats to spend two-days per week litter picking.  There were also plans to integrate some of the litter picking with the hedge trimming and edging work.

The team had increased staffing levels in certain areas to help get the levels of detritus down to meet the contract specification.  The Whitespace handhelds would help highlight the trends and patterns in cleansing complaints and staffing levels/times would be adjusted to suit the needs of the contract.  An Integration Supervisor had also been introduced to act as a link between the streets, collections and grounds services.

The Panel was then advised that Hampshire County Council had reduced the number of weed sprays in the Borough from two per year to one from 2017/18.  To maintain the service, Serco had added weed control to the contract and committed to carrying out a further spray across the Borough with two sprays in some areas.  A number of Serco staff had been trained to a national qualification standard in chemical weed spraying to enable the team to complete spraying during the Spring, depending  ...  view the full minutes text for item 13.

To receive a presentation updating members on the development of the Masterplan for the Farnborough Civic Quarter area (report attached).

The Panel received a presentation from Nick Irvine, Principal Planning Officer, on the development of the Masterplan for the Farnborough Civic Quarter area.  The Farnborough Town Centre Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) adopted in 2007 identified a vision and set of objectives for the town over a 10-15 year timeframe.  The SPD focussed on the need to unify and strengthen the Civic Quarter and its functions and provide new public space.  The Farnborough Civic Quarter SPD set out a vision, design and delivery principles and an example scheme layout to guide future development.

AECOM had been appointed as the consultant to lead on the development of the Masterplan and to take forward an outline planning application for the former police station site as a first phase of development on behalf of Homes England (formerly the Homes and Communities Agency).  The landowners had entered into a memorandum of understanding in March 2017 to jointly masterplan the Civic Quarter, enable regeneration to come forward on a phased basis and work collaboratively throughout the design and delivery phase.

There were six plots within the development parcel which included the Iceland store, Library, former Police Station, Community Centre, Leisure Centre and Westmead House/Sulzers Roundabout.  The Iceland store was in a strategic position that was integral to achieving improved connectivity.  Discussions would be held with tenants to understand their position and future plans.  Hampshire County Council was not in a position financially to relocate the Library at the current time, although it was keen to support the delivery of the wider masterplan.  Demolition of the former Police Station had been completed in March 2017 and Homes England would be looking for expressions of interest in January 2018 with a full invitation to tender expected in March 2018.  The Community Centre was owned by the Council and existing users would be relocated prior to redevelopment.  Discussions would be held with the users to agree the way forward.  Options for the redevelopment of the Leisure Centre were being considered, it was likely to be developed in parcels to enable a continuity of use of some of the facilities.  Westmead House and Sulzers Roundabout was owned by the Wilky Group and there was currently well established office use with good occupancy levels.  Options for the site were being explored and discussions would be held on whether the site should be retained or reprovided.

There would be public engagement activity carried out to inform the final masterplan to balance community use, public open space and leisure.  The Panel felt it was important to maximise the channels of engagement to give all residents the opportunity to comment and feel that their view had been heard.  The public engagement activity would run in late Spring/early Summer. 

The Panel expressed concern regarding how the infrastructure would cope with additional housing in the town centre.  The Panel was advised that Hampshire County Council was currently working on a Farnborough Growth Package to address the increase in traffic.  Developers would  ...  view the full minutes text for item 14.

To discuss the Panel’s current work programme and consider items for future meetings (copy attached).

The Panel discussed the current work programme and it was requested that issues on noise pollution relating to fireworks, co-ordination of temporary lights/road works and the Farnborough Growth Package be added to the work programme as items for a future meeting.  The work programme would be discussed at the mid-cycle meeting where it would also be confirmed whether a Panel meeting was required in both February and March.