1.1 An Area Action Planning process was introduced in September 1999, with the aim of achieving an easily understood 'bottom up' process by which elected representatives, local people, community groups and organisations could influence the District Council's services, and engage relevant agencies in tackling local priorities. The process was also intended to provide a means by which councillors could monitor the progress in tackling issues through regular 6 monthly monitoring reports.

1.2 The process was refined each year but continued to be driven by the Council's annual business planning cycle. This process has to be linked to the budget cycle which revolves around the timing of the annual Government grant. This timetable is therefore given and the Council must work around it. However, it does create difficulties for Area Community Committees in providing a timely response to local issues.

1.3 A further difficulty experienced with the previous Area Action Planning Process was that no means were provided by which issues raised by local people could be worked up through consultation and research into solid proposals for action. In summary, the drawbacks to the previous system can be summarised as follows:

1.3 Experience has shown that the Area Action Planning process needs to be more flexible if it is to be able to respond in a timely way to local issues. Area Community Committees need to be able to agree and monitor actions taken to tackle a variety of local issues - ie not merely those that are included in EHDC Business Plans. The process will need to manage expectations without stifling the creativity and enthusiasm of local people, community groups and other organisations. It is considered that in order to achieve this, officers will need:-

2.1 It is proposed to tackle the drawbacks within the previous system by changing the Area Action Planning process from its previous annual cycle to a new rolling programme. This would lead to the development of an Area Programme, to which Area Community Committees can add proposals at any time, agree actions and monitor outcomes. Area Community Committees may choose to:

2.2 This is not a comprehensive list of actions and some issues will need to be the subject of a variety of actions, e.g. undertaking research, developing a partnership, a costed project plan and finally identifying the necessary resources. However, the process would allow the ACC to monitor each stage and to amend or terminate an action in line with changing circumstances.

2.3 The development of an Area Programme will enable Area Community Committees to identify issues and agree actions to tackle them. The issues and resulting action would be placed into one of 5 categories as follows:-

3.0 Development of the Programme

3.1 The new approach will lead to the production of a much broader document recording all the stages in addressing an issue. An issue would first be considered and, if supported by the Area Community Committee, resources identified and action agreed. It is most important that local people and Members are able to monitor the delivery of the actions more effectively than in the past. Therefore a more robust framework for area performance management is required which would enable the right level of information to be reported back to local communities, local partners, the East Hampshire Community Partnership, regional and national government as required. At each stage Area Community Committees would be able to review the actions being taken, amending as necessary and obtaining vital publicity and recognition for the work being carried out by the District Council, partner organisations and voluntary groups. Further work is required to ensure that the process is properly underpinned in this way. At present, the Council's performance monitoring extends to those actions which are included in the Corporate Action Plan, Strategy Action Plans and key corporate project plans, aswell as business plans. Area actions could be monitored in a similar way and included in the Performance Management reporting system.

3.2 The procedure would be as follows:-

- When an issue is identified and the Area Community Committee resolves to seek ways in which it could be addressed, an 'area action record' would be commenced. This would be in the form of a simple A4 sheet recording details of the issue and the initial actions agreed by the Area Community Committee (see Appendix 1 to this report for a draft example).

- Actions subsequently taken to tackle the issue would be recorded and reported to the Area Community Committee. This will enable Members to monitor progress and amend actions and timescales where appropriate. It will also provide the opportunity for publicity and recognition of work carried out, and when necessary, explain why progress has not been achieved.

- The intention will be to develop an IT database in due course which would enable the information to be recorded electronically by any officer involved in the project. However, there would be no need to delay implementation of whilst such an IT database is being developed.

3.3 The new process will enable initial work to be undertaken to research issues, consult with stakeholders and identify resources prior to the inclusion of the issue in one of the District Council's Business Plans. This process will also provide the opportunity to involve other partners who could either include the action in their own business plan, or perhaps take a lead in a new partnership.

4.1 The adoption of a more responsive and managed approach to the Area Action Planning process and the development of a rolling Area Programme will enable the Area Community Committee to identify issues, and to agree, monitor and amend actions to address them. In time it will also provide a source of well researched issues and costed project proposals that can be acted upon when the opportunity and resources arise either via the District Council's own business plans or via those of other Community Partners.

4.2 In order that these benefits can be achieved, the Area Action Planning process must be fully integrated with other processes/systems within the Council, for example business planning and performance management. In the longer term, a robust local performance management system will need to be developed at the area level. Officers throughout the Council will need greater capacity to respond to issues, both in terms of time and skills.