Minutes of ACF Meeting
Thursday, 26th March 2009

Southwick Green Communal Lounge, Southwick

Present: - Wendy Farmer (Chair), Bridget Orman (Vice-chair & Secretary), Ruth Andrews, Fred Bathurst, Hugh Bean, Rose Boden, Bill Bone, Keith Bones, Pat Franklin, Sue Holland, George Jones, Paula Kinsella, Elsie Kitson, Sue Lane, Bob McClellan, June Moulton, Sylvia Page, Tanya Page, Ron Pope, Stan Reed, Brian Smith and Edna Wye.

ADC: David Pannell (Executive Head of Adur Homes), Terry Cutler (Finance Manager) and Barry Maxey (Tenant Participation Officer).

Welcome and introductions

Wendy welcomed everyone to the meeting.

Apologies

Apologies were received from Barry Page. 

3. Customer access – Local Offices

David explained that he and Terry are members of the Council’s Customer Access Working Group, which is looking into how members of the public wish to access council services. He said they had been invited to the meeting to find out the views of the ACF on the Local Offices so that they could take these views back to the group. They stressed that the council has not made any decisions about the future of the Local Offices and that they had an open mind on the matter.

David said that Adur Homes had already found savings in staff costs but further savings will need to be made. Some of the options being considered include reducing the external decorating contract and doing away with the scheme for decorating older people’s homes but savings could also be made from changes to the local cash and housing offices. 

These two services are somewhat interdependent but there would be an annual saving to the Housing Revenue Account of £26,000 from closing the local cash offices and another £40,000 per annum from closing the housing office, in addition to savings on the maintenance costs of the buildings. Extra income would also be produced for the council by letting the Lancing Office and from selling the Southwick Office.

Questions and comments: -

Q. How will older people cope with this change, as many like to pay their bills each week in cash?
A. Alternative methods include paying at post offices or shops (although it was questioned whether these facilities are already overstretched), as well as direct debit and standing orders. Terry said the council recognises that some people would need help from staff but the number of these people visiting the local offices is diminishing and extra help could be provided by having more drop-in help points around the district.

Q. Where would the finance come from to pay for these help-point services?
A. These would be funded from Council Tax and the Housing Revenue Account in proportion to the services used.

Q. What percentage of tenants pay rent at the cash offices?
A. About 10%.

Q. What would the money from savings be spent on?
A. This could be spent on improving services or on reducing rent.

Q. What would happen to people living in Lancing who need to have benefit documents photocopied, as they find it particularly difficult to get to the Civic Centre? 
A. Adur Council is thinking of introducing visits for benefit claimants at places convenient to them, as this has proved elsewhere that it is cheaper and more effective than corresponding through a series of letters.

Q. People also go to the local offices to make complaints in private and wouldn’t necessarily want council staff visiting them at home.
A. If more drop-in surgeries were available, they could discuss issues with staff there.

Q. What would happen to the ACF Office if the Southwick Office is closed?
A. An alternative venue would be found. This could, for example, be one of the empty shops that the council already owns.

Q. Some residents have had difficulty recently using certain types of card payments.
A. Adur will be bringing in a new cash-receipting system over the summer that should solve a lot of these problems. As an extra benefit, this system will also allow people to pay by card at help-point outlets.

Q. Won’t the Local Offices be closed anyway, whatever the ACF says?
A. David listed a number of examples where the council has listened to the views of the ACF and made decisions based upon what they have said. He said that comments from the ACF will be passed on to the Customer Access Working Group and the Cabinet will take these into account when making decisions about the Local Offices.

Wendy thanked David and Terry for coming along to answer questions and they left the meeting at this point. 

4. Minutes of the last meeting 19th February 2009

The minutes were agreed.

Matters arising

Ruth reported that the Millennium Garden was looking very much better now that it has been tidied up but that it now required some more plants to fill the gaps in the bed.

George asked when the meeting of the Compact Monitoring Group is going to take place. He was informed that the ACF Management Committee met recently to go through the draft compact and had suggested a number of alterations. These will be incorporated into the new compact, which will be delivered to all tenants’ and leaseholders’ homes in the next couple of weeks.

6. Treasurer’s report

Ruth reported that there is £2,577.06 in the bank account and petty cash of £62.59. A cheque for £310.50 has been sent to Greenscape for work on the Millennium Garden.

7. Bids for environmental improvements

There were no bids for environmental improvements grants.

8. Cabinet Agenda

Item 8 : Adur Homes – Reconsideration of Rent Increases for 2009/10

The ACF welcomes the belated change of heart by the government in reducing average guideline rent to a more realistic level but is disappointed that the cost of implementing these changes will have to be met by tenants. Not surprisingly, we support the recommendations in this report to take up the government’s offer and to smooth out remaining payments over the rest of the year.

Item 9 : Housing Strategy 2005 – 2010 – Monitoring Update

Report noted and revised Housing Strategy supported.

Item 10 : Choice Based Lettings – Review of First Year of Operations

The ACF would like to clarify how the cost of the Sussex Homemove mutual exchange register will be proportioned between the Housing Revenue Account and housing associations.

Someone who has experienced the scheme in operation said she found it demoralising as a third choice tenant to view a property at the same time as first and second choice tenants. The ACF would like to know what percentage of properties are allocated to third choice tenants. 

9. Reports of the Sub-Committees

i) Compact Monitoring Group

See Section 5 above.

The Forum

Draft copies of the next edition have been distributed to members of the Editorial Team but alterations and final articles are required as soon as possible if this publication is to meet the deadline for Easter delivery.

Adur Leaseholders’ Forum

Bill reported that there haven’t been any further meetings of ALF but that the next one is due to take place on Wednesday, 1st April 2009.

AiP

Ruth explained that their next meeting is on 15th April 2009, where they are proposing to merge the Sustainable Community Strategies of Adur and Worthing.

10. Any Other Business

Stan questioned why SHARP is no longer listed as a sub-committee and was told that they are independent of the ACF.

Barry gave details of the Greening Campaign being adopted by Adur and Worthing Councils to engage communities in reducing their CO2 emissions. Presentations on this are being held on 6th April at the Worthing Town Hall and on 8th April at the Civic Centre (both start at 7.30pm).

The evening raffle raised £24.00 for ACF funds.

11. Date of next meeting

The dates for future ACF meetings will be set when the details of 2009/10 Cabinet meetings have been announced.