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| The flag of Northumberland |
I thought people might like to see the monthly report I ask from the officers in the portfolio I am the executive member for on Northumberland County Council. Here are the highlights for December:
December Highlights for Customer Relations and Culture
Portfolio
Our Facilities
A
variety of planned improvement works started and took place during December,
including:
·
Preparation
for the new integrated facility for Seaton Delaval at Astley Community High
School. This included a special ‘book buy’ to purchase new stock specially
tailored for the local community. The integrated facility opened successfully
on 2 January, 2013.
·
The
Library and Customer Information Point at Amble being relocated to the Tourist
Information Centre on Queen Street to allow building works to create a new
integrated facility to take place at the current ‘library’ site.
·
Building
works for the new integrated facility at Cramlington; plumbing, foundation and
technical works were completed in the lead up to Christmas.
·
New
internal and external signage being fitted at Morpeth Tourist Information
Centre.
·
Rutherford’s
department store ‘dressing’ Morpeth Town Hall free of charge for Christmas,
resulting in a large number of couples saying how “spectacular” the building
looked for their special day.
Contact Centre
A
total of 21,213 calls were received. 76.6% were answered within 20
seconds. 3.9% were abandoned against a
target of 5%.
The
Fire and Rescue Service completed its first month of delivering the Council’s
‘out of hours’ contact centre service with no major concerns raised.
Blue Badges
All completed
applications were processed within the 5 working day target.
Weddings
118
weddings took place compared with 79 in December 2011.
Resident’s survey
The results of the North East
Residents’ Perception survey were released. This showed that 49% of people in
Northumberland feel well informed. Representing an increase of 10% since the
last full Place Survey in 2008, this is a significant rise. Ipsos Mori
called this a ‘wow’ moment in their presentation on the results.
Library Initiatives
As
part of the national campaign to get more people using the internet, libraries
helped 270 people get online during the first week of December 2012, booking
bus tickets to London, undertaking job searches, filling in job applications,
finding a long lost relative and tracing a family tree.
A survey to
find out what customers think about the new mobile library routes introduced in
April 2012 ended on 19 December. The results of the survey will be available in
February 2013.
Local
Democracy Campaign
Planning for a local democracy
campaign with branding, online and printed material took place. A big push in
the New Year will be focusing on voter registration (particularly among young
people) with a drive to encourage more people to become parish councillors.
Creative People and Places
The
Creative People and Places programme gathered views from 1,700 people living in
South East Northumberland to inform the development of its business plan for a 3 year
artistic programme (which needs to be submitted to the Arts Council in February
for approval). Views were gathered via a questionnaire that was made available
at public facilities, including libraries and GP surgeries, and online.
Woodhorn was
asked to take the national lead in managing the Creative People and Places
network and is bidding for a further £170,000 to fund this work.
Arts Venues
Queen’s Hall Arts Centre (QHA) hosted the D’Oscars 2012. This Learning
Disability Film Festival included short films and a number of workshops and
projects to develop skills and encourage self-expression. Representatives were
drawn from as far afield as Hexham, Haltwhistle, Dilston, Blyth, Saltburn,
Carlisle, Aspatria and Australia.
QHA delivered its first ever pantomime in December. Audience numbers exceeded
targets and the show, The Adventures of Robin Hood, received rave reviews.
The Beautiful Berwick Town Team and Berwick Visual
Arts were awarded funding from the Arts Council to develop a pilot project to
help identify if there is demand for a permanent print facility in
Berwick-upon-Tweed.
Kielder
Kielder
Water and Forest Park was awarded £100,000 Arts Council funding to support a
project to develop new audiences through digital technologies and rural
landscapes.
Northern Film and
Media (NFM) briefing event
An
event was held in early December to encourage location filming in
Northumberland. Involving partners, landowners, Council officers and NFM, the
economic benefits of location filming and the successes achieved for the county
were outlined.
North
East Tourism Awards
The North
East Tourism Awards will be held at the Sage, Gateshead on 31st
January 2013. ‘Gold’ award winners will be automatically entered into the
national tourism awards organised by Visit Britain. Highlights from the shortlist
include:
·
Corbridge
TIC (visitor information category)
·
Woodhorn
Museum and Archives (sustainable tourism category)
·
Kielder
Water & Forest Park (best tourism experience category).
Customer and
Cultural Services team members were involved in recruiting judges and managing
the judging process for six of the 14 categories.
Portas Projects
Customer
and Cultural Services team members supported the work of both the Newbiggin and
the Berwick Portas Town Teams during December. Both have developed plans for
their projects and tourism has been identified as a priority action in both.
The Newbiggin plan is further advanced with many of the tourism aspects of the
plan nearing completion. A new brand and marketing campaign have been developed
and will launch, along with a new Visit Newbiggin website in mid-February.
Improved visitor signage will be installed by the 31 March.
South East Northumberland Section 106 Panel
South
East Northumberland Section 106 Panel met in December and awards were made to
Newbiggin Town Council (refurbishment of the Skate Park); Blyth Cricket and
Rugby Club (development of a second Rugby pitch); Cramlington Learning Village (creation
of a cycle speedway track and cycle hub); and Ellington and Linton Parish
Council (safety surface Linton Village Play area), benefitting around 2,000
residents of all ages.
Leisure
Capital Programme
The results
of the conditions survey, commissioned as part of the Leisure Review work,
indicated that there was an immediate requirement for works to be completed at
a cost of £960,000. Funding has been secured to tackle these urgent works at
the earliest opportunity. This money is in addition to the £1.7 million already
being spent on leisure infrastructure.
Bedlington Leisure and Gallagher Park
The
Gallagher Park steering group took place on 12 December. The meeting was very
well attended and discussed the spending of newly secured SITA funding.
A
further meeting of the Bedlington Leisure steering group is planned for January
where BVAL will present a business case for a community leisure facility using
the vacated sports facilities from the current Bedlingtonshire High school
build.
Ashington Community and Leisure
Facility
An
application was submitted to the Sport England Iconic Facilities fund in
December for £942,000. The new facility is projected to increase participation
in sport over the coming years from 300,000 participants in the first year of
opening to over 415,000 in year 5. Existing user numbers are approximately
160,000. A decision will be made on the fund in March 2013.
The planning application
for the new facility was considered and agreed by the Council’s Central
Planning Committee on 8 January 2013.
Leisure –
The Way Forward
A
Leisure Review Overview and Scrutiny Task Group and the Council’s Risk
Appraisal Panel (RAP) gave their views on the way forward for leisure provision
during December. This informed the content of a delegated decision, which was
also signed.
Awards and Quality
Standard Achievements
Wentworth Leisure Centre was runner up in the APSE performance network’s best performer award for sports and leisure.
Ashington Leisure
Centre scored 100% in the Institute
of Qualified Lifeguards (IQL) assessment which took place on the
11 December. This is a fantastic result and improves on last year’s excellent
score of 93.94%. The assessor summary stated they were “a very passionate and
pro-active team”.
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