To receive a verbal update from the Director of City Development.
Minutes:
The Director of City Development, Martin Farrington, provided an update to the Committee regarding how the Directorate has responded to the Climate Emergency. This was a part of a year long programme of visits to the Committee by each of the Leeds City Council’s Directors.
The City Development directorate includes the service areas of asset management & regeneration, culture & economy, highways & transportation, planning & sustainable development and operations; and Active Leeds.
Some of the key work undertaken within the City Development Directorate included;
Economy & Culture
There has been work to integrate the climate emergency agenda into economic development within the city. The Inclusive Growth Strategy refresh, which has a prominent focus on environmental issues was presented to the Committee in November 2022 by the Head of Economic Policy. The strategy will have an emphasis on climate change and mitigation.
Leeds Innovation Vision has developed partnerships across the city to support business adaptation to net zero.
The Destination Marketing and International Relations plan (approved by Executive Board in October 2022) has laid out a strategy for ensuring sustainability within the hotel sector, whilst promoting the city as a tourist destination.
The Sustainable Arts in Leeds (SAIL) has been funded by Leeds City Council as a not-for-profit member's network to help deliver the Net Zero carbon emission and Zero Waste ambitions within the cultural and creative industries.
The Leeds 2023 Year of Culture will have its Sustainable Action Plan monitored over the course of the year. Highlights include a sustainable music event planned for the summer. The programme will explore the theme of climate change and sustainability and continue to exchange best practice with key international partners.
Green Skills
The Future Talent Plan launched in September 2022 and has recruited a green skills lead. The lead will map existing and future needs of the sector to identify gaps within provision. The series of ambitions contained in the plan will support people to develop and maintain the skills required for economic and environmental resilience within the city.
As part of the mayoral pledge to create green jobs for unemployed people, there have been a number of Gainshare funded programmes, working with Leeds City College, Leeds College of Building, LCC Sustainable Energy, businesses, WYCA and skills providers to develop skills provision in the city.
Regeneration
The Our Spaces Strategy key strategic document was adopted in March 2020 to support the delivery of new greening proposals. Green spaces developed include Aire Park, Playhouse Gardens, Meadow Lane, Corn Exchange, Wellington Place, Cookridge Street, Sovereign Square and David Oluwale Bridge and City Square.
Housing Growth
The specifications for the 1200 new build homes programme included the delivery of new homes with no gas boilers with some including Electric Vehicle charging points. Technologies utilised have included Air source and Ground Source Heat Pumps and solar PV panels. The programme has delivered it’s first set of homes to be granted an EPC A rating.
Highways & Transportation
The Director noted that the following item on the agenda was regarding Mass Transit, as well as new governance arrangements within this area. This included the establishment of a Climate Emergency Task Group, creation of a Climate Emergency Officer role and a Climate Adaptation Plan. The Council aim is for Leeds to be a city where people do not need to own cars.
Following the presentation, the Director and Members of the Committee discussed the following details.
Carbon reduction will be factored into not only large-scale projects and contracts. A series of frameworks for smaller contracts have been developed to ensure that this work is embedded across the supply chain.
There was discussion regarding the carbon benefits of improving existing council buildings against replacing them, such as at leisure centres. The Fearnville Leisure centre was cited as an example of a building which needs replacing entirely.
The timescales for new build social housing programme were noted as being over a five-year period with further details to be provided.
Further detail on the greening of the city centre were provided, as part of a long-term strategic approach. The priorities were identified as being the quality, quantity and distribution of green spaces. This provided the basis for works such as those around the former Tetley Brewery, including the David Oluwale bridge and Aire Park.
The Committee discussed the prospect of congestion charges being introduced, with the current Council position being stated of there being no current plans to introduce this.
The Committee noted that one of the benefits for cities with mass transit systems is that the revenue created can be invested in the bus system should any surpluses form the fair-box arise.
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RECOMMENDED: The Committee thanked the Director for attending the Committee and noted the verbal update.