Issue - meetings

As detailed in the recommendations.

Councillor Bibby introduced the report which provided an update on the Council’s sheltered housing review, the proposed methodology and scoring matrix and the communication and engagement plan.

The Council’s Housing Revenue Account (HRA) housing stock consisted of circa 7,300 properties with approximately 2,500 of those being classed as sheltered stock.  With future standards increasing in terms of the Welsh Housing Quality Standards (WHQS), Welsh Government’s ambitions with regards to decarbonisation, the need to ensure sheltered properties continued to meet the contract holders needs and the costs associated with investment and future maintenance, the Council were now required to ensure that any future expenditure was allocated appropriately. The options for those sheltered assets deemed to require significant investment to comply with current and future standards or were no longer meeting the needs of contract holders, were redesignation to general needs, refurbishment or demolition.

The review would adopt a holistic approach to the sustainability of the sheltered housing stock and reviewed each scheme from an asset management perspective to identify the current and future investment needs of each scheme, WHQS works and de-carbonisation and compliance considerations.

That information would be aligned to housing management intelligence and insight which would review and assess demand / turnover and desirability to determine the sustainability of each scheme.  Each scheme would be assessed against a sustainability matrix with four possible recommendations, each of which were outlined in the report.

It was important for the Council to ensure that its offer to current, and prospective, sheltered housing contract holders was attractive, competitive and meets current expectations and aspirations.  It had been several years since the Council last reviewed its offer to sheltered housing contract holders and it was timely that the offer was updated.

The Chief Officer (Housing and Communities) said that following a report to Community and Housing Overview and Scrutiny Committee in March 2023, it was requested that a Sheltered Housing Review Task and Finish Group be established.  That group had met on three occasions to consider the Terms of Reference, the Scoring Matrix and the Communications and Engagement Plan.  That Scoring Matrix and Communications and Engagement Plan were outlined in the report which had also been considered and supported at Community and Housing Overview and Scrutiny Committee the previous week.

RESOLVED:

(a)       That the methodology proposed to assess the Council’s sheltered assets be supported;

(b)       That the communication and engagement plan proposed to assess the Council’s sheltered assets be supported; and

(c)        That the future assessment work to sheltered housing assets and progress to an options appraisal stage if investment concerns are highlighted through its in-depth review be supported.