The agenda for the next Council meeting looks like it will be a boon for the insomniac. Apart from the proposal to increase Councillors pay – which perhaps inevitably gets the prime place on the agenda – the rest is largely a jumble of random thoughts.
There are now two Leaders reports (presumably to satisfy the rival egos of the coalition partners). Neither provides any new information. Both are comprised mainly of anecdotal commentary on what third parties have achieved (York BID, Enterprise Zone etc.).
The Council’s Leader (Chris Steward) seems to be preparing the way for a “U turn” on Council subsidies for the Guildhall project and the York Central development, together with building on the Green Belt.
His deputy (Keith Aspden) skates around the fact that, 4 months after the City offered to accommodate Syrian refugees, not a single child has arrived in the City.
The Council has changed its constitution so that written questions cannot be tabled to report authors (or any other post holder for that matter). Thus another opportunity to promote informed decision making has been lost. In its place is a limited time for verbal questions, the answers to which will be lost in a jungle of political ducking and diving.
So what should the Council Leadership have been briefing residents on? Well there are at least three obvious, and worrying, issues:
Lack of management leadership. 6 months after a temporary Chief Executive was appointed, there is still no sign of a permanent
West Offices
appointment. In turn, this means that posts further down the hierarchy remain unfilled. Some Chief Officers seem content to contribute to the anarchy by taking to the bunkers whenever residents raise (often valid) criticisms.
The absence of KPI data on street level services is a disgrace. In their absence none of the post holders at the York Council can be judged on their effectiveness.
The “front office” (the first point of contact for residents) is slow to respond and occasionally chaotic. The responsible Executive member (Council Leader) really needs to explain why a – deeply flawed – “on line” issue handling system was launched two months ago without proper testing.
Elsewhere on the agenda there are four motions. All fall into the pious hand ringing category. Passing them will make little difference to York residents as the levers for change are held by third parties (with the possible exception of a proposal on elderly people’s isolation).
Still the new Council – although shy about the urgency of decision making – is still better than the one it replaced. By this time in 2011 there had been a covert attempt to sell off the Union Terrace car park while adding £20 million to the taxpayers debt burden.
So perhaps indecision is better than hyper-decision making!
Illustrative York Central Masterplan approved in 2019
The council’s “continued role” in unlocking a new generation of jobs, homes and cultural facilities in the York Central site will be considered by the Executive next Thursday, 22 April.
Funding to complete infrastructure works at the York central site (located behind the railway station) is being made direct to the landowners – led by Homes England – by the government.
It means that the Council’s role will be peripheral despite many millions having already been invested in the project. That may be good news for taxpayers who have seen projects like the Community Stadium and Guildhall refurbishment delayed and go over budget in recent years.
Now contract supervision and liability will rest mainly with Homes England.
Transparency isn’t a strong point for any of the “partners” involved in the York Central project (or the current York Council for that matter). We doubt if engagement will improve under the new governance arrangements.
The Council does remain the planning authority although that role could be undermined as they pursue “Enterprise Zone” status for the project. Planning rules are lax in such areas.
Council report April 2021
The Council is still set to spend nearly £50 million on the project and is dependent on the additional business rate income from Enterprise Zone new businesses to repay its borrowing.
The report being considered next week skates over the risks of this approach,. Those risks appear to have increased since the pandemic with office based developments likely to be less attractive for a while at least.
There are a number of significant planning issues still to be resolved.
These include the (bizarre) suggestion for making the Leeman Road tunnel one way, the absence of an attractive pedestrian/cycle access from the Wilton Rise area and continuing doubts about severing the existing Leeman Road footpath link near the Railway Museum
“Despite the ongoing challenges of the pandemic, the council has worked with York Central partners Network Rail, Homes England and National Railway Museum to maintain momentum and progress on the 42 hectareYork Centralsite.
After partners finalised the £155 million funding, secured planning permission and started work on the infrastructure to unlock the site, which will deliver up to 2,500 homes and space for up to 6,500 jobs.
Executive will be asked to approve changes to the way the project will be delivered and managed.
This includes the main grant holder, Homes England, taking on the delivery of the bridges, footways, cycleways, roads and other infrastructure to open up the site.
The council will also receive £3.86 million from the government grant to cover the costs incurred advancing the infrastructure project”.
By the 1st July the COVID infection rate in The City had dropped to 3.32 /100k head of population. It had peaked at 96.8 on 5th May. Case numbers were to remain low until September.
During the first wave of infections, 171 York residents had succumbed to the virus. Many had been care home occupants.
The government announced a £5 million budget for drainage and repair works on Tadcaster Road. Resurfacing of the road had just been completed……. Laptops were loaned to needy children allowing them to study at home……. The Council offered “two hours of free parking” in an attempt to get the City centre economy moving again. The concession didn’t apply to the main shopper car parks…… Playgrounds and libraries reopened in early July. …………..The Council had spent £354,326 on marketing and communications during the pandemic…….. Changes to footstreet hours were approved at a behind closed doors meeting – prompting further criticism about secrecy…………. It was revealed that the “Yorspace” housing commune had failed to complete the purchase of a plot allocated to them at Lowfields. By contrast adjacent sites reserved for “self builders” were being snapped up….The annual review of Councillor lodged issueswas published… York was touted as a new home for the House of Lords…… A controversial plan to have a “North Yorkshire” elected Mayor was announced. This prompted months of agonising about changes to Council boundaries… The Acomb Front Street marketreopened… There were continuing delays on building projects including the huge British Sugar site on Boroughbridge Road.… It was revealed that the York Council had spent £4.5 million the previous year in buying up commercial property in the City. The Councilsnet debtsclimbed to £289 million during the same period. An overspend of £1.8 million on the James House project was revealed …..The Council as forced to take emergency action to modify access arrangements onFossgate…. Revised plans for the front of the railway station were announced.
August
By 1st August the COVID infection rate in the City had fallen to 0.29. It was to be the lowest figure that the City would since the start of the pandemic.
A 3 bed semi at the Councils Lowfields development was priced at an eye watering £295,000…. York City centre was busy with visitors. Car parks like Castle and Marygate were full. By contrast the car park at the station was virtually empty….. Planning permission was granted for a proposal to build houses on the Bootham Crescent football ground. The opening date for the replacement stadium at Monks Cross had passed with a lot of work still outstanding. It was unclear when football matches would recommence…….. The York Central development secured £77.1 million in public funding…. One consequence of the pandemic had been a 51% increase in unemployment levels… a Public Right of Way was established across Acomb Moor. It was promptly blocked off by a farmer… The York Museums Trust needed a £1.95 million bail out. following its extended COVID closure….. The Council confirmed that it would spend £1.65 million buying 150 acres of land to establish a new forest near Knapton. Questions were raised about using high quality agricultural land for this purpose….. It was revealed that a large amount of space at West Officeshad been rented out by the Council. That retained for its own use had been little used during the pandemic with many officials working from home… It was proving to be difficult to get utility companies to remove graffiti from their cabinets… The promised replacement children games area in Kingsway West had not materialised. The old “MUGA” had been taken over as a builders compound. It was later revealed that talks to use a site at the Thanet Road Sports Area has stalled….. There were still too many long term empty Council houses in York. 1597 people were registered on the housing waiting list….
September
The Coronavirus infection rate in the City had risen to 2.86 by 1st September. The “second wave” was to continue rise during the month before peaking in October. Additional restrictions were introduced by the government on 22nd September. Mainly affected pubs and face covering requirements
Visitor numbers to the City had increased during August although they still fell short of the numbers seen in previous years….. Schools reopened…. The taxi shuttle service link from the disable parking spaces at Monk Bar car park into the City centre had not proved to be popular…..The Groves road closures went live on 2nd September. Reaction was mixed with some suggesting that an emergency vehicle route should have been sustained. ….. E-scooter hire arrived in York…. 29 Castlegate a former youth service building had remained empty for 4 years. There was no sign of the Council putting it on the market…
October
The Coronavirus infection rate sat at 129.62 on 1st October. It would continue to rise before peaking at 444.9 on 16th October. The rise coincided with the arrival of a large contingent of students in the City. The infection rate in Heslington was to reach 1720 on 15th October before falling away. Heslington and Tang Hall currently have the lowest case numbers in the City.
Work on refurbishing the Lincoln Court independent living units on Ascot Way was completed…… Consultation started on plans to upgrade the A1237 northern by pass... The condition of the cycle track network continued to decline…. £1.25 million was to be spent on public electric vehicle charging points in York…. Wrangles over York’s Local Plan continued (endlessly) . ….. A Council report revealed that the numbers cycling and using public transport to get around the City had both fallen…. The Peacocks store in Front Street Acomb was set to close. It joined many other retail and hospitality outlets forced out of businesses by the pandemic…. The details location of the new “Knapton Forest” was revealed, The Council remained tight lipped about a further area of woodland that it hoped to plant “near to the inner ring road”……COVID restrictions in York were increased to Tier 2 level on 17th October. Infection rates had already started to reduce……. The ruling coalition majority was reduced by one as Green Councillor Dave Taylor quit the Green Party. He had been criticised for comments made about the late Jack Charlton…….. There was an increase in the number of thefts of catalytic converters from vehicles in York… The Council announced that its new head of paid service (replacing the Chief Executive) would be Ian Floyd ……
November
Coronavirus infection rates had dropped from a high of 444.9 (recorded on 16th Oct) to 205.1 by 1st November. A national lockdown was to be introduced on 5th November when the rate stood at 191.8. It was to fall steadily during the lockdown period which ended on 2nd December. Eventually the rate bottomed out at 57.93 on 8th December. Since then it has risen sharply
By the beginning of November City streets were already looking empty…. A local contact tracing service was launched… Rain slowed some road resurfacing projects …. There was more criticism of social housing management standards in the City…. The York Museums Trust announced a 30% cut in staffing levels….. Work on the new Centre of Excellence for the Disabled was completed. Poor work on facilities in the surrounding area was criticised…… £658k of government funding for transport schemes was announced. A very mixed bag which included new cycle lanes on Acomb Road in Holgate and improvements for cyclists on the A1237 Ouse Bridge….. York Central was granted planning permission. Concerns about the accesses from Leeman Road and Wilton Rise were not addressed…. The Council reviewed its property portfolio. It decided to a[give a developer 12 weeks to complete the purchase of Oakhaven which had been empty for 4 years…. The Police announced their first “on line” digital event….A Council planning committee declined to approve plans for new flats and a multi story car park at the Castle/Piccadilly site …….. Fly tipping was a continuing problem in and near York…. A deal to lease space at the new Community Stadium for restaurant use fell though. It added £1.375 million to the taxpayers bill…More bad news for taxpayers as the costs of the Guildhall renovation project soared to £21.7 million…
December
The infection rate stood at 76.44 on 1st December. York entered Tier 2 restrictions the day after. Local MPs had pressed for a Tier 1 designation bowing to pressure from the hospitality sector. The subsequent rise in infection levels suggest that a Tier 3 designation would have been a safer option. York started the month with the lowest number of Coronavirus cases. It was to end the month with the highest infection rate in the region (406.4).
A homeless report said that the number of “rough sleepers” in the City was now very small…. A £3 billion price tag was placed on the Councils ambition to see the City become “carbon neutral” by 2030. …. The Make it York tourism organisation was heading for a £1 million loss. It would – like Welcome to Yorkshire – be bailed out by the Council … By 5th December streets in the York Centre were busier…. A new winter support grant was set up to help needy families… New lateral flowCOVID tests were available which provided very quick results. Students took the tests before returning home for the holidays… The Council launched an “on line” consultation on its budget choices. The choices were carefully limited to avoid any awkward results…… a new report highlighted growing problems with unemployment in the City. Young people living in the Westfield area were particularly hard hit…. a new COVID vaccination centre opened on Moor Lane near Tesco…. Completion of the Community Stadium complex was finally confirmed. Originally scheduled to be built in 2012, it was some 8 years later that it actually became available for use. Within days, the leisure and sports facilities there were to be closed again following the introduction of Tier 3 restrictions….. The year was to end with the first of the Coronavirus vaccine injections taking place in the City. Although a new more virulent strain of the virus had emerged, this was partly offset by news that a new vaccine was now available.
as the New Year started roadworks were taking place on The Mount. Roadworks in that area and Tadcaster Road were to prove to be an embarrassment for the Council later in the year.
A 4% increase in Council Tax levels was announced. There would be expenditure on a £3 million “forest” while a Councillors pay increases would cost £141,000.
Plans to provide a “driverless shuttle” service in the pedestrian area were revealed – to be greeted with general incredulity
The Council’s new team of graffiti removers was having some success.Council contractors blocked a footpath link from Acomb Wood to Acomb Moor. Twelve months later the right of way is still impassible in wet weather. The Lowfields development got underway. Neighbours were unhappy as delivery lorries blocked roads and damaged verges
The Castle Gateway budget was revealed as £55 million. The Council intended to borrow £45.8 million to help fund it.
Bootham Park hospital would be sold for use as 125 “independent living” homes
Concern was rising about the delay in completing the £42 York Community Stadium. The York Knights said they would play there on 9th February 2020. As 2020 ends, the stadium has still to host its first fixture
The Low Poppleton Lane camera enforced “buses only gate” continued to attract criticism about poor signage. The Council gets about £100,000 for fines levied on drivers who misuse the route.
The Council stopped publishing responses to Freedom of Information requests on its web site. It was rightly critised for being too secretive.
The Council confirmed that the first Coronavirus case identified in the UK had been linked to York University. At the time few realised the impact that the virus would have on everyone’s life during 2020. At the time Public Health officials said that the risk was “very low”
The York Council decided to spend £2 million on anti terrorist security measures.
New Council bungalows – incorporating electric vehicle charging points – were completed on Newbury Avenue. The controversial Spark container village on Piccadilly was coming to the end of its lease. The owners had not fulfilled some planning conditions and the expectation was that the lease would end and the site would be sold. It didn’t work out that way.The York Council decided to sack its weed control contractor. The City had been overgrown the previous summer. New arrangements worked better during 2020.
The amount the Council intended to borrow continued to increase. Critics pointed to high redemption costs and interest charges.
The Council increased its investment in flood protection measures
Disabled tenants were told that the Council would not cut the grass and hedges in future. There had been no consultation. Later Council officials tried to backtrack on their letter
In a “behind closed doors” decision senior Councillors decided to make the York Council’s Chief Executive – who had been on sick leave for nearly a year – redundant. The cost of the exit package was put at over £400,000.
The Council and developers updated their plans for the York Central site which lies behind the railway station. The plans involved making the Leeman Road tunnel single lane working – raising a storm of protest.
The were an increasing number of complaints about poor quality road maintenance standards.
Another Coronavirus case was identified in York on 4th March. Lockdown 1 followed soon afterwards
The project to refurbish the Guildhall and establish a “business club” there ran into further difficulties. Costs spiraled.
The Council was forced to admit, following a Freedom of Information request, that it owned a large number of empty properties. Some had been empty for over 5 years.
The Council agreed to grant the Theatre Royal £500,000 for improvement works
The Council confirmed that it would try to sell the plot at Lowfields, allocated for an elderly persons care home, to a private developer. The developer would be expected to provide “extra care ” facilities. In effect the Council reverted to the original plans for the site which was agreed in 2010.
The rest of the quarter – and indeed the year – was to be dominated by the fight against the pandemic
The York Council is set to admit that a deal to underwrite the construction of 3 restaurant units at the York Community Stadium, branded in 2017 as “highly risky”, has flopped.
A meeting next week will be told that the Authority must either lease the empty units itself or face an increase of £1.375 million in its contribution to the Community Stadium budget
The news comes one week after the authority was forced to admit that another restaurant, which it constructed as part of the Guildhall renovation project, will also remain empty. That restaurant was supposed to provide £150,000 a year in rental income which would have been used to offset the costs of the Council’s new Guildhall “business centre”.
2017 budget
The Council agreed in October 2017 to accept liability if the developers were unable to lease the Community Stadium restaurant units.
Now with “practical completion” only apparently a few weeks away, and the units still not leased, the Council must decide whether to reduce the sale price for the commercial block or to lease the units itself for 25 years.
Another option, offered by land investment company L&G, would be for the Council to, effectively, buy out their interest in the units.
A Council report says, “Accepting a lease of these 3 units would also enable the Council to facilitate subletting’s for the units to a wider market as the Council could review offers from local and smaller businesses that would not be considered under L&G’s corporate benchmark although subletting’s are subject to L&G’s approval”.
Maybe so.
But the hospitality industry has changed beyond recognition recently. Even before COVID struck, two of the adjacent existing restaurant units (not owned by the Council) had become empty.
Existing Monks Cross restaurants are struggling
It is likely to be some years before Monks Cross becomes a destination location with a high footfall.
The Council could also find itself competing against itself to let restaurant units at both Monks Cross and the Guildhall
The Council has not published a business plan which would guide its next set of decisions.
There should be no more ill considered adventures using taxpayers money.
The City already faces cuts to basic public service standards as a result of COVID. Taxpayers should not be expected to subsidise empty floorspace.
A report to a Council meeting next week offers a limited insight into the York Councils property dealings. It comes at an opportune time with various other Councils having been badly burnt recent by injudicious investments in land and property. Croydon and the Cambridgeshire County Council are both heading for the local government equivalent of bankruptcy.
Against that background taxpayers might would hope for York Councillors to now to adopt a more measured approach to investment. The commercial property market is likely – in the wake of the pandemic – to remain depressed for some time. It is not a good time to sell assets.
Instead we find a plan to borrow an additional £4 million on top of the £384 million already committed. That is a debt of nearly £2000 for every man, woman, and child in the City. 20% of tax payments will have to go towards paying interest charges.
This has remained empty since occupants were moved out – prematurely as it turned out – in 2016. The sale for a new care home to Ashley House fell through in early 2017. No attempt was made to find even a temporary use for the site which occupies a prime location near to local amenities and good transport links. Maintenance expenditure on the empty building continued to fall on taxpayers. Now the council is proposing an “off-market” sale to regional care home operator, Burlington Care Limited. The size of the offer has not been revealed. Ironically, the officer report admits “An open market exercise may be impacted by COVID 19 suppressing property values. The council budget has been significantly impacted by COVID and there is a need to realise value from vacant assets in the near future”
Another former care home, which has been empty for nearly 5 years, is Willow House. It is on a prime site located next to the city walls. The site was nearly sold for student housing in 2017 but ran into planning difficulties. Other offers were ignored by the Council and an offer from a company which utilises empty residential accommodation to accommodate the homeless in return for caretaking and security duties, was spurned. Now it seems that the Council intends to build 40 apartments on the site and will probably use its own “Shape” development company to manage the investment. The site is worth more than £2.3 million.
Willow House – empty for 5 years
Morrell House
An elderly person’s home empty since early 2018. No use has been found for the site. It is to be considered for use by “self-builders” but if that is not successful it will be sold on the open market.
Moor Lane car park
This is the site currently in use as a flu vaccination centre. It has mostly been empty for the last 4 years. There has been a lot of developer interest in building on the site. The Council has decided not to include it in the Council house building programme and may therefore sell it on. On the open market – even in these depressed times – it is likely to be worth less per acre than the Willow House site.
The sale of this home to private care home operator “Yorkare” has stalled. COVID is blamed
& the strange ones
Generally, taxpayers have benefited in the long run when the Council has bought land and buildings in the City. There have been exceptions. For example, when the authority impulsively sold the site now occupied by the Hiscox insurance company on Peasholme Green. Had it included a betterment clause in the sale then taxpayers rather than shareholders would have benefited from the subsequent increase in land values.
Knapton Forest
It looks increasingly likely that the purchase of good quality agricultural land near Knapton, with the intention of planting trees on it, may go into the same ill-considered category. When wooded, the area will not have a resale option but will involve an ongoing maintenance liability. 180 acres will support 50,000 broadleaf trees making a, carbon sequestration, contribution to the £1.2 trillion additional trees which would be required on the planet to reverse climate change! The £1 million project is also hailed as a major new passive leisure option for residents although, in truth, it is poorly positioned to make up for the open space lost in recent years to building operations in the City’s poorer areas.
Knapton Forest site
The major issue remains the lack of an environmental impact assessment. The land currently contributes to the local food supply chain. If the land is lost to food production, imports may increase resulting in longer transport chains and – critically – higher carbon emission levels. Storing carbon – like burying nuclear waste – simply pushes a problem onto the next generation.
The key to improving the environment is to reduce carbon emissions. Even the government seemed to recognise this, with its initiative yesterday aimed at replacing gas boilers with heat pumps and other benign energy sources.
Eco centre
The Eco centre is the small business facility at Clifton Moor which was promoted by the Council some 15 years ago. It was provided via a “design and build” contract on Council owned land.
Occupation levels have been encouraging although usually reflecting the general state of the economy. There are 63 individual units there. The Council currently leases back the centre and has managed the facility since 2015. The rent paid by tenant contributions is claimed to offset the current running costs.
Now officials are recommending that the Council spends £3.9 million buying out the interests of the owner of the building. The Council is not revealing how its business case figures stack up, but it claims that it may generate additional income by fitting PV (solar) panels on the roof.
Judged against the current economic volatility this looks like a high-risk strategy.
The plans for the non-listed section of the Guildhall have been an economic “basket case” for several years. The opportunity to sell part of the building for residential, retail or hotel use represented the least risk option and should have been pursued in 2012 when the building first became empty.
Guildhall
Instead, against a background of neglect and rapidly increasing repair costs, the Council opted for a risky plan to establish a hi tech small business start-up centre. The overall viability of the plan depended on letting part of the space as a high-end restaurant. The Council said it would run the unit itself.
£20 million of taxpayers money is at risk.
Now York University, via its Science City offshoot, has apparently offered to lease the business centre space at the Guildhall. Some civic and community use would continue. Science City has a generally good reputation and the offer to get the Council off its, self-inflicted, hook would seem to be an attractive one.
It is unclear how the success of the new enterprise would be judged. It is even less clear how the demand for City centre “incubator” space will mature in the wake of the pandemic.
The restaurant shell building will remain empty awaiting a resurgence of the local visitor economy.
The Council currently has a 9.2% minority stake in York Science Park Ltd. which it would sell.
The lease deal would be “off market” raising once again accusations of a “family and friends” approach to commercial dealings.
“Town and Gown” relations are already stressed in the wake of the pandemic and a perceived lack of accessibility for residents and visitors to the historic Kings Manor buildings in the City centre, which are currently occupied by the University.
The Council has pointedly not published updated business case figures which reflect the new offer being made as well as ongoing concerns about the cost of the renovation project..
Risk Management
On what must be one of the most risky approaches to the financial management of Council owned property, the Risk Management assessment included in the report amounts to only 7 lines of text and concentrates entirely on the planned bid for the Eco centre.
Community Stadium not completed, Guildhall business club costs rising
The Council has revealed, in the small print of a report to a meeting taking place this week, that “as part of the council’s response to the COVID_19 pandemic all major procurements are on hold in the short term”. This comes as no surprise with the Castle/Piccadilly development one of these projects now shelved
Council progress report July 2020
The Council has expected to recover its investment there using “long term revenue from commercial space”. Speculative building of that sort looks to be that thing of the past for a few years at least.
The same report reveals for the first time that, late last year, the Council purchased 25-27 Coney Street for just under £2.85 million This is the block containing the Holland and Barrett store. Just how the rent freeze during the health scare will affect income from this and similar commercial property investments is not explained in the Council report. Generally speaking, in the long run, the City has always benefited from civic investment in land and property ownership. Values in the past have always risen faster than inflation. In the short term, though, such purchases may place additional burdens on taxpayers.
25-27 Coney Street
There may be a bigger issue emerging at the Guildhall where delays have caused an escalation in the cost of the £20 million renovation and remodelling project. The report is, however, still claiming that the hugely expensive project will provide “a comprehensively refurbished and renewed Guildhall complex to provide a contemporary business venue for the City, the works include a green energy solution and dramatically improved facilities for community, civic and council use, with a riverside restaurant unit alongside”. Time will tell.
The report confirms that the “Community Stadium” is still a “live building site”. “All certification and testing will only recommence once Government allows the gathering of people to resume, but only at that point. When all contractors and partners are able to return safely to the site to fully complete the works, they will. Only at that point can the Stadium look to hold test events required and open thereafter”. There is no comment in the report about the commercial and community uses planned for the site or the likely timescales for bringing all spaces into use.
Anyone’s guess when the Community Stadium complex will be fully occupied
Without test events being possible, it now seems unlikely that the football or rugby clubs will be able to play at the stadium from September (the likely start of the National League football season) .
The Councils net debts increased to £289 million in the year up to April 2020.
That was an increase of £43.4 million over 12 months.
The figures are revealed in a report to a meeting taking place this week.
The Council net debts are forecast to increase to £452.4 million within the next 5 years.
This will mean that nearly 25% of Council Tax income will be spent on interest and redemption charges.
The figures don’t take into account the toll that Coronavirus has had on finances over the last 4 months.
Although interest rates are at historically low levels, the Councils income steams have been badly hit. In turn this affects the authorities ability to service its debt charges.
Projects which depend on asset sales for funding are also facing challenges. The commercial property market may be depressed for several years.
The report fails to provide an update on the assumptions made about commercial letting returns.
As well as an expanded shops portfolio, the Council has embarked on a series of projects, like the Community stadium and the Guildhall renovation, which depend partly on rent income from office and commercial space to pay for the investment.
Empty offices at Monks Cross
Several Council owned offices are currently empty.
The Council, is particularly reluctant to say whether the speculative offices, which it agreed to underwrite at Monks Cross, have yet found a tenant.
It looks like the Westfield area has been snubbed in the latest highways maintenance budget allocations.
In another “behind closed doors” decision, tens of thousands of pounds, from “delegated” ward budgets, has been allocated for highway and footpath repairs plus some other work like new parking laybys.
Areas benefiting are Bishopthorpe, Clifton, Copmanthorpe, Dringhouses, Fishergate, Guildhall, Heslington, Heworth, Hull Road, Holgate, Huntington, Micklegate and Rural West.
One of the roads omitted from repair programme
The absence of Westfield from the list is doubly surprising.
Some local roads are in an appalling condition.
Local Councillors were given lists of problem locations over 6 months ago.
Poor weather in the intervening period has seen some surfaces – such as those on the Morrell Court access road – deteriorate quite markedly.
The report to the decision meeting gives details of how much money is available for local ward Councillors to manage.
It also explains the assessment process.
“The Ward Highways Capital Scheme is a four-year programme formed from £250k p.a. of capital resources set aside from the main Highways Capital Programme. It is designed to allow wards to bring forward schemes that are important to local residents but would struggle to be prioritised as part of the main capital programme. A nominal allocation is made to each ward on a population basis. Wards are able to aggregate their allocation by carrying over / bringing forward annual allocations in order to undertake more substantial schemes.
The programme was enhanced in 19/20 through the allocation of the following one-off amounts to it:
£500k to use for highways improvements in respect of Roads and Footways
£500k to use for Walking and Cycling improvements
(NB. Details of how the walking and cycling budget is being spent were published a couple of weeks ago. Yet again no projects in the Westfield area were agreed).
The Council says the aim is to use this funding flexibly to meet the needs of wards whilst taking account of all relevant legislation and statutory guidance as highways are heavily regulated environments.
The following process is used to identify schemes:
Community Involvement Officers liaise with ward councillors, residents and key partners to identify potential schemes
The Highways team bring forward condition surveys, customer requests, and safety audits for consideration by wards to help inform their decision-making together with information showing the roads in the ward that are to be repaired through the main capital programme
Ideas are taken to a ward walk-about for initial consideration followed, where appropriate, by detailed feasibility work and any appropriate community / statutory consultation
The Highways team then form the prioritised ideas as far as possible into a coherent capital programme”
Wards not receiving an allocation were Acomb, Haxby, Heworth Without, Hull Road, Holgate and Westfield.
The list of improvements that have been agreed can be viewed by clicking here
It looks like the traditional figure signposts on the City centre will start to disappear shortly.
New direction sign in foreground. Old finger sign in background
Theprojectto replace them with a “modern” equivalent could cost taxpayers £350,000 with a similar matching contribution coming from the York Bid.
Controversial in many ways, the timing of the expenditure looks even more suspect against the background of a City centre now desperately trying to attract local shoppers.
The future off the redundant finger signposts has been highlighted by a campaigning Councillor. He wants to repurpose the posts for use in sub-urban York and in the surrounding villages.
This seems like a sound idea.
A new cast iron post can cost as much as £4,300 and repurposing existing signs would not only be cheaper but would also meet the Council’s environmental objectives.
Arguably the finger signs are also less visually intrusive designed as they were to complement Conservation Areas.
So what will happen to the recovered posts?
No one seems to know.
There are many locations – not least the routes of the public rights of way made even more popular for exercise during lock-down – which would benefit from better way marking.
Consigning the iron posts to the scrap heap would add insensitivity to the poor judgement of the original decision.
rs” decision, tens of thousands of pounds, from “delegated” ward budgets, has been allocated for highway and footpath repairs plus some other work like new parking laybys.
