DD134 Continuing OPDC's Community Review Group

OPDC's Community Review Group (CRG) was set up in 2018 as a one-year pilot-project to give feedback on planning applications and public realm projects. Due to a lack of schemes coming in for review, the pilot-run was extended by a year to ensure the group has sufficient opportunities to demonstrate its effectiveness. The Group is managed independently by Frame Projects, on behalf of OPDC. Group members are recruited from people living, working or regularly spending time in the OPDC area.

The Group is currently made up of 12 members who do not represent existing organisations or community groups. Rather, each member represents themselves. The Group is carefully selected to reflect the diversity of the wider area.

In January 2020 the Group members, Frame Projects and OPDC representatives from the Design Team, the Planning Directorate and the Communications & Engagement Directorate evaluated the Group's 18-month pilot-run and concluded that the Group has been successful in delivering on OPDC's plan to ensuring that new development is of the highest quality and in empowering local people to have a say about the urban design process. The review concluded that the Group should continue its work beyond the initial pilot-phase.

Approval is being sought to spend £11,300 on the recruitment new Group members. This includes £8,300 for the professional services of Frame Projects of unspent budget set aside for the pilot phase previously approved in DD067. The remaining £3,000 will be spent from the Communications & Engagement budget on social media advertising to ensure the recruitment reaches hard to reach demographics in the wider area.

In response to the decision to continue the CRG beyond its initial pilot-run, it has been decided that current members will resign in order to make room for new members and voices from the community. OPDC has therefore asked Frame Projects to recruit new members to the Group to replace vacant positions from outgoing members, and expand Group members to 15.

The recruitment of new members is intended to fill positions left by outgoing members, and increase group membership to 15. This will allow the group to include people that will help it to better represent the diversity of the wider area.

Frame Projects will produce recruitment material and manage the selection and the new members' induction process. Since reviews are paid for by the applicants, no further costs will incur on OPDC for the management of the CRG by Frame Projects.

OPDC will support the recruitment process with a dedicated communication strategy, including a paid social media campaign of the recruitment advertisement. The advertising run will be managed by Wavemaker working under contract for the GLA. OPDC has access to their services as part of shared services agreement.

The recruitment process has been carefully drawn down up to ensure access to the application procedure and to ensure that group membership is inclusive. Interested individuals will be asked for their motivation to join the group, and to complete a diversity monitoring form. The latter will be used to ensure the final group makeup reflects the diversity of the population of the wider area in terms of gender, sexual orientation, age groups, disability and ethnic and cultural background. For that purpose, OPDC's Engagement Team have created a diversity baseline drawing on statistics complied by OPDC, GLA, the Boroughs and the Office for National Statistics.

The recruitment of new members will focus on ensuring the group's diversity better reflects the diversity of the population of the wider area. There is a particular intention to focus on young people (18-24), parents of young children, blue collar workers, and boaters.

Due to the ongoing COVID-19 crisis it is expected that CRG meetings will continue to be held online for the foreseeable future. New members will require internet access to join the panel. Therefore, the recruitment will be advertised solely online, through OPDC's website and newsletter. In addition, OPDC will run targeted advertising through social media.

By advertising the recruitment process on social media, OPDC wants to ensure it reaches as many people as possible withing the catchment area, and to hard to reach individuals whom OPDC would not be able to reach through its traditional communication channels.

The CRG was the first of its kind. Since its establishment, several other planning authorities have set up their own version of the CRG, including LB Southwark, LB Redbridge and Dacorum District Council. Several other local authorities are considering following suit, including LB Epping and LP Tower Hamlets.

Group members are not paid, but do receive training in topics they request as a group. So far, training has been provided in Urban Design principles and Planning principles.

The Group's governance has been successful in addressing the risks outlined in DD067, and will continue to do so:

a) Reluctance of developer to request review sessions, in particular for smaller schemes: CRG review fees are kept considerably lower than Place Review Panel fees. During the 18-month pilot, no applicant has refused to go through Community Review.

b) Inability to reach consensus between CRG members on recommendations: the Group is facilitated by an external Chair, Tony Burton, who has been appointed by Frame Projects. The position of Chair was initially intended to be handed over to Group members. But during the governance meeting in January 2020 the Group members unanimously decided to continue with the same external chair.

c) Risk of personal interest of CRG members interfering in the review process: Group members have to declare any conflicts of interests ahead of each meeting. So far, this has only occurred once, and the Group has acted in a professional and responsible manner.

d) Risk that OPDC is unable to attract a diverse range of community members to sit on the CRG: OPDC is building on the success of attracting a diverse range of community members with an updated diversity baseline and targeted social media advertising to target harder to reach applications.

Expenditure of up to £11,300 will be funded from the 2020/21 budget as follows:

• £8,300 professional fees for Frame Projects to produce recruitment material, application forms, and manage the selection an induction process of new members.
• £3,000 for advertising the recruitment on social media, sourced from OPDC's Comms & Engagement budget

It is advisable that approval is sought in advance for the ongoing costs of the CRG and that procurement rules are adhered to secure value for money. Whether a direct contract is awarded or a new procurement exercise is required, early engagement with Procurement is recommended to mitigate any potential delays. Further expenditure is subject to the corporation's decision-making process.