Decision details

The board considered a report of the interim Executive Director of Housing,

Property and Regeneration that provided an update on the status of the

Housing and Land Funds programme including findings and proposed

actions from a review undertaken over the last quarter.

The interim Executive Director of Housing, Property and Regeneration,

John Godfrey, reported that following a review of committed projects

and the project pipeline for the three existing housing funding streams, it

was proposed to reassign and reallocate projects across the funds to

ensure the WMCA meets the Government’s minimum housing outputs and

Housing Start date as appropriate.

The proposed changes to the funding programme and proposed

reallocations were set out in section 4 of the report.

The Housing, Property and Regeneration Consultant, Martin Yardley,

reported that  WMCA officers would be speaking to  local authorities

colleagues regarding their schemes and proposed schemes to ensure they

comply with the grant conditions.

Resolved that:

1.    The current status of the devolved Housing and Land fund programme be noted;

2.    The work undertaken to date to identify and reduce the level of risk associated with under-delivery of the requirements for each fund be noted and

3.    The actions proposed in the light of the findings of this work be endorsed including;

a.    Review and refinement of the existing pipeline, including re-allocation of previously committed projects within the funding programme and placing on hold projects with low or non-existent housing outputs and/or low possibility of delivery and

b.    Review and refinement of existing internal project developmental/approval processes to accelerate deployment of grant funds to projects with enhanced likelihood of delivering outputs in line with grant conditions for value money and speed of delivery.