Minutes

* declared a personal interest as Members also of the Borough Council.

Councillor Smith welcomed those present and introductions were made.

The Chair of the Parish Council stated that they had requested this meeting because over the past three to four years the Parish Council, the Borough Council and Diocese regarding three areas of land at Dalton.  The three parties had been involved in a joint marketing venture and had spent a significant amount of time since 2002 on this issue.  The three had a Participation Agreement which had been drawn up about 12 months ago.

Recently the Parish Council had been informed that the land in Council ownership was to become part of the Housing Market Renewal Pathfinder.  The Parish Council had therefore asked for this meeting to clarify the situation.

The Housing Market Renewal Team Leader provided some background information about the regeneration work.  It was explained that the ODPM had allocated an amount of money to South Yorkshire to try to support the housing market where it was fragile and vulnerable to collapse and where there were neighbourhoods of low demand housing.  The Housing market renewal area in Rotherhamhad been split into five Area Development Frameworks (ADF’s) and Dalton was in Rotherham East ADF.  An ADF Manager and Consultants were appointed and the Consultants had carried out a Masterplanning exercise.  Information had been gathered for a baseline assessment and that had been analysed and Spatial Masterplans had been developed utilising this information.  Steering Groups had been established made up of community stakeholders and officers to help develop the masterplans and action plans contained in them.

The Masterplan set out a vision for the East area of Rotherham within which this land sits.  The Council did not wish to propose development of any land in isolation and wanted to consult stakeholders.

There had been recent talks with a Housing Association about how to unlock the potential of Dalton and there had been previous discussion with the Parish Council and Yorkshire Housing.

Housing Market Renewal had three key objectives which were to increase housing choice by improving the range and affordability of housing;  increase housing quality by improving design and providing property that met aspirations, and creating sustainable housing.

At this stage there were no firm plans for the land, however, a bid had been put in to Government for funding for a detailed plan to  ...  view the full minutes text for item 16.