Issue - meetings

To consider the attached report.

The Executive Board NOTED the report.

The Executive Board considered a report which provided an update on progress with the establishment and development of the Housing Development Agency.

Alan Carter, Managing Director of the Housing Development Agency, presented the report and gave Members a presentation which provided information on the Agency’s objectives, the changing environment as a result of the introduction of the Housing and Planning Act, achievements since the summer 2015 and the way in which the Agency operated in terms of its customers, its geography, how it added value and its unique selling point.  It also set out the land, scheme fees and operational budget and the Agency’s approach to the recruitment, retention and deployment of staff capacity, knowledge, skills and experience that it needed. 

Mr Carter took this opportunity to introduce the Executive Board to the following members of his team:

·         Sabrina Walston – Assistant Managing Director;

·         Gill Anderton – Housing Development Manager (South Cambridgeshire District Council);

·         Nicola Hillier – Housing Development Manager (Cambridge City Council);

·         Sarah Lyons – Housing Development Officer;

·         Mark Wilson – Housing Development Officer;

·         Amelia Norman – Trainee Housing Development Officer.

The presentation included a flowchart which illustrated the structure of the Housing Development Agency team.  

Mr Carter reported that the existing programme up to 2018/19 consisted of approximately 800 to 820 homes, with progress in relation to those schemes set out in the appendix to the report.  Section 8 of the appendix outlined the strategy for delivering these schemes based on the following four themes:

·         working with strategic housing and planning colleagues to understand the range of new housing needed in terms of tenure;

·         optimising partner land opportunities;

·         working on funding models and testing the viability of mixed tenure schemes;

·         working with partners whose ambitions were aligned with the Greater Cambridge ‘growth’ agenda including other landowners.

Mr Carter provided photographs of schemes that had been completed at Latimer Close and Stanesfield Road in Cambridge, Fen Drayton Road in Swavesey and Meldreth Road in Shepreth, some of which fell under the definition of affordable housing and were located within windfall sites in the city or rural exception sites in South Cambridgeshire.  Members of the Board were impressed with the quality of the developments that had been completed and noted that the Virido development in the Cambridge Southern Fringe had commenced.

The Executive Board NOTED the report and presentation.

To consider the attached report.

The Joint Assembly NOTED the report.

Consideration was given to a report which provided an update on progress with the establishment and development of the Housing Development Agency.

Alan Carter, Managing Director of the Housing Development Agency, presented the report which provided information on the Agency’s objectives, the changing environment as a result of the introduction of the Housing and Planning Act, achievements since the summer 2015 and the way in which the Agency operated in terms of its customers, its geography, how it added value and its unique selling point.  It also set out the land, scheme fees and operational budget and the Agency’s approach to the recruitment, retention and deployment of staff capacity, knowledge, skills and experience that it needed. 

Mr Carter reported that the existing programme up to 2018/19 consisted of approximately 800 to 820 homes, with progress in relation to those schemes set out in the appendix to the report.  Section 8 of the appendix outlined the strategy for delivering these schemes based on the following four themes:

·         working with strategic housing and planning colleagues to understand the range of new housing needed in terms of tenure;

·         optimising partner land opportunities;

·         working on funding models and testing the viability of mixed tenure schemes;

·         working with partners whose ambitions were aligned with the Greater Cambridge ‘growth’ agenda including other landowners.

The Joint Assembly NOTED the report.