Agenda and draft minutes

Venue: Guildhall, Abingdon OX14 3HL

Contact: Susan Harbour Democratic Services Team Leader 

Items
No. Item

28.

Apologies for absence

To receive apologies for absence.

Minutes:

Apologies were received from councillors: Tony de Vere, Jason Fiddaman and Helen Pighills.

29.

Minutes

To adopt and sign as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Committee held on 4 February 2014 (previously circulated). 

Minutes:

The minutes of the meeting held on 4 February 2014 were agreed as a correct record of the meeting and the chair signed them.

 

30.

Declarations of interest

To receive any declarations of disclosable pecuniary interests in respect of items on the agenda for this meeting.  

Minutes:

There were no declarations from councillors.

31.

Urgent business and chair's announcements

To receive notification of any matters, which the chair determines, should be considered as urgent business and the special circumstances, which have made the matters urgent, and to receive any announcements from the chair.

Minutes:

None notified.

 

32.

Statements, petitions and questions from the public relating to matters affecting the committee

Any statements, petitions and questions from the public under standing order 32 will be made or presented at the meeting.

Minutes:

Steve Oaks, from the Abingdon Camera Club, spoke when this item was considered.

33.

Capital Community Grants pdf icon PDF 254 KB

To consider the head of corporate strategy’s report. 

Minutes:

Capital Community Grants.

 

The committee considered the head of corporate strategy’s report. This set out details of four applications the council had received for capital community grants: requesting a total of £13,673. The report also set out the financial position, there being £44,024 remaining in the current year’s budget, which included £17,510 of unallocated funds and under spend carried forward from the previous financial year.

 

The committee considered each application, assessing it against the grants criteria and awarded grants as follows:

 

Applicant

Project

Grant

Comments

Abingdon Camera Club

Upgrading IT equipment

£1,847

Members mostly from Abingdon. Subscriptions £30 pa and £2 per meeting or £60 pa. membership has risen from 21 to 33 in 16 months.

Award as per officer recommendation.

Abingdon Rugby Club

Replacement set of patio doors and shutters

£3,800

Despite capital reserves of £342,791, available monies for use at 31.08.13 were £8,831*

Club should be encouraged to apply to Abingdon Town Council.

Award as per officer recommendation.

Drayton Village Hall

Kitchen refurbishment, replacement windows and fire doors

£5,000

This is part of a larger project which has been split into discreet mini projects.

Award as per officer recommendation.

St Nicholas Preschool and Playgroup

Replacement of the outdoor play surface

£3,026

Award as per officer recommendation.

 

*The Committee requested that, for future rounds, the evaluations should include an organisation’s available funds in addition to the total assets.

 

Scheme’s Policy: non-agenda item.

 

After considering the applications, the committee decided to discuss the scheme’s policy and to make comments to the Cabinet member as follows:

 

·            More flexibility in the allocation of funds, to award more than 50 percent of project costs/ £5000, if needed and the money was available.

·            In the policy, under "Decision Making", to add an "s” to "committee" to change the wording to read: "grant applications will be determined by the relevant area committees".

·            In the policy, under “Opening and closing dates” to read: references to an election should be changed to DISTRICT elections.

·            The Abingdon Area Committee is granted less money per capita than other area committees, under the policy, and the committee would like the policy changed to redress the imbalance. They would like consideration to be taken of the fact that clubs and facilities in Abingdon attract users from out of the area, but the costs of maintenance etc are borne by Abingdon residents under the current policy.

·            The policy should contain an expectation that applicants will apply to their town or parish councils, and that a section on the application form, and the report to committee should contain an "if not, why not" question.

 

Additionally, the area committee asked officers for clarification on the schemes which area committees could initiate, and officers undertook to get this information back to the committee, as soon as possible.

 

The committee requested that the first round of applications in 2015/16 could open as early as possible after the elections, so that applicants would not need to wait an entire year between rounds: officers agreed to  ...  view the full minutes text for item 33.

 

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