Issue - meetings

The New Communities Portfolio Holder REFUSED the application as the £25,000 grant could not be justified in the current financial climate.

Decision taken Tuesday 14 December 2010 and published Wednesday 15 December 2010.  Call-in expires at 5 pm on Wednesday 22 December 2010.  Decision can be implemented from Thursday 23 December 2010 if not called-in.

The New Communities Portfolio Holder refused the application. 

The New Communities Portfolio Holder considered a report relating to a grant application relating to a community-based public art project costing £25,000 as part of a major capital development at Cottenham Village College. 

The application originally had formed part of a comprehensive grants report presented to the New Communities Portfolio Holder meeting on 7 October 2010, but had been withdrawn from the agenda at that time to allow additional preparatory work to be carried out.  The report had not been published as part of the agenda for the current meeting, but the New Communities Portfolio Holder had agreed to admit it as a late item on the grounds of its urgency, the applicants needing a decision ahead of the next New Communities Portfolio Holder meeting in January 2011.

The Development Officer distributed a table setting out a timeline and the key actions and opportunities for community involvement.

The New Communities Portfolio Holder said that the reduced availability of resources, and a worse-than-expected financial settlement from central Government, made this a difficult application for the Council to meet in full.  He engaged in discussion with the Arts Development Manager in an effort to establish whether or not part of the proposal could be waived (or funded in some other way) to enable the Council to make a smaller grant than that applied for.  

Those present discussed the application in general.  The New Communities Portfolio Holder noted that the workshops envisaged appeared to be intended as an opportunity for providing ongoing and transferrable skills.  He suggested that charging for attendance at these might be a helpful step forward.  However, the opposing view was that local people simply wanted to attend the workshops as a means for becoming involved in the project under consideration.  

With reluctance, the New Communities Portfolio Holder refused the grant application in respect of a community-based public art project costing £25,000 as part of a major capital development at Cottenham Village College.