Council heading for £3 million budget deficit. £800,000 cost of keeping sports facilities closed.

With only a few weeks to go until the end of the financial year, the York Council says it will overspend by £3.7 million. Any deficit would be a charge on the Council’s reserves (which currently stand at £7 million)

Most of the deficit is blamed on the COVID-19 pandemic. Details can be found here

Council income has dropped with car parking revenue severely affected.

There are major overspends on children’s social work services including safeguarding vulnerable children with 93 local children currently subject to proceedings.

Adult social care could also overspend by £2.7 million.

There are also major pressures to bail out the indoor sports centres which are managed by GLL.

The council continues to have discussions with GLL over the cost of managing the centres during the year. The council has been required to fund the net cost of the facilities whist closed and GLL have suffered from reduced revenues when the facilities have been open during the year. The likely additional cost to the council is currently forecast to be c.£800k but the council and GLL are seeking Government / Sport England funding to mitigate this cost.

The main problems with Council housing relate to a repairs backlog and the lengthening time to relet empty properties.

The report contains a highly selective report on public service quality standards. It talks about the – entirely unsurprising – drop in bus usage.

It pointedly fails to mention the appalling decline in the standard of highway surfaces. Despite being reported long before the icy weather – and lockdown – commenced, potholes were only given cursory attention. The result now is that many carriageways are dangerous particularly for users of two wheeled transport.

Potholes on Askham Lane near the A1237 roundabout and others on Foxwood Lane

& maybe part of the solution

Council could face £2.7 million COVID overspend

The York Council has revised down the impact that the pandemic may have on its budget this year.

It had previously talked of a £20 million deficit.

This is now much less following some government funding including additional support for the loss of income from fees and charges. The Government will fund 75% of any loss

Nevertheless, the Council believes that it may have to eat into its £7 million reserves to balance the books this year. Next year may be even more challenging with Council Tax and Rates income set to fall.

A list of the pressures on the Councils budget can be read by clicking here

The Council has not tabulated the “mitigation” measures that it is taking to reduce expenditure.

There has been increased expenditure on helping the elderly and disabled. The work of volunteers has been praised by the Council.

A report being considered next week says, “The Council has remained committed to our Home First approach to managing people’s recovery, avoiding placements in residential and nursing care whenever possible. However the impact of COVID-19 and the associated lockdown has meant that more people than we had planned for have needed social care funded through the council. This together with increasing mental health referrals, the increased cost of care and the 4 more complex needs of those the council is supporting has resulted in increased pressure on the adult social care budget”.

Council slow to repair empty Council homes.

One of the largest drops in performance is in re-letting empty Council homes. This has increased from 37 days at the end of March 2020 to 59 days at the end of June 2020. Delays to repairs are still a major problems with this service and so far the Council are choosing not offer work to local tradesmen many of whom would the opportunity.

The published performance results (click) don’t provide information on key COVID measures (e.g. traffic and cycling levels).