Borough would like Haverhill forum to do less
Monday, 15th September 2014.
Haverhill's only dedicated borough council forum is being asked to put its meetings onto a less formal basis.
Haverhill Area Working Party (HAWP) has been asked by the chief executive of St Edmundsbury Borough Council to review its role and consider a 'lighter touch'.
This would mean not requiring specific reports from officers on issues, or updates on progress of initiatives unless there was a particular decision to be taken.
Currently, much of HAWP's business is taken up with monitoring how issues are progressing, with the only request on each item being to 'note' it, rather than make any decision.
This has come about relatively recently after members requested items to be put on the agenda because so little was coming forward from the borough that meetings were being cancelled.
HAWP's equivalents in other areas of the borough, the Bury Area Working Party (BAWP) and the Rural Area Working Party (RAWP) had also suffered cancellations through lack of business and had decided to turn them into general discussion forums, rather than structured meetings.
In the light of that, chief executive Ian gallin asked members at their meeting last week, how they would like to proceed, and whether they would accept officers not having to take up time writing reports to them.
Members agreed to think about the matter and debate it at their next meeting.
It was suggested many issues could be directed to the ONE Haverhill board instead, but members pointed out this did not meet in public.
Haverhill Area Working Party (HAWP) has been asked by the chief executive of St Edmundsbury Borough Council to review its role and consider a 'lighter touch'.
This would mean not requiring specific reports from officers on issues, or updates on progress of initiatives unless there was a particular decision to be taken.
Currently, much of HAWP's business is taken up with monitoring how issues are progressing, with the only request on each item being to 'note' it, rather than make any decision.
This has come about relatively recently after members requested items to be put on the agenda because so little was coming forward from the borough that meetings were being cancelled.
HAWP's equivalents in other areas of the borough, the Bury Area Working Party (BAWP) and the Rural Area Working Party (RAWP) had also suffered cancellations through lack of business and had decided to turn them into general discussion forums, rather than structured meetings.
In the light of that, chief executive Ian gallin asked members at their meeting last week, how they would like to proceed, and whether they would accept officers not having to take up time writing reports to them.
Members agreed to think about the matter and debate it at their next meeting.
It was suggested many issues could be directed to the ONE Haverhill board instead, but members pointed out this did not meet in public.
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