Council celebrates a year of success

Ashfield District Council has performed above and beyond over the past 12 months.

Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, the Council has not only continued to deliver high quality services across the District but also additional services such as payment of covid-19 business grants and making our high streets safe for shoppers

Cllr Jason Zadrozny, Leader of Ashfield District Council said:

“Despite the pandemic Ashfield District Council successfully continued the delivery of all its services through the pandemic, the only Council in Nottinghamshire to achieve this.

“The Council sets out its ambitions and priorities for the next few years in the Corporate Plan. This is reviewed every year to ensure we are delivering on our priorities and to the standard expected by residents.”

Over the past 12 months the Council has worked together effectively as ‘one council’, re-deploying staff into important roles outside of their normal duties to ensure services continued, as well as delivering humanitarian services to vulnerable residents across the District.

Successes delivered by Ashfield District Council in the past 12 months include:

• Through the Ashfield Community Fund over £40,000 was distributed to the Community and Voluntary sector in Ashfield, to help them support residents negatively impacted by Covid.
• £70,000 Infrastructure grants distributed to Our Centre, Under one Roof, and Ashfield Citizen’s Advice.
• Work has commenced on two new affordable council housing developments. A 22 unit development of family homes and adapted bungalows and a further nine homes, including a four adapted bungalows.
• We have been the lead authority in securing £1m Rough Sleeper Initiative funding for improvement opportunities and support for rough sleepers and those threatened with rough sleeping across the county.
• Confirmed that £62.6 million has been secured for Ashfield as part of the government’s Towns Fund. Together with funding secured from the Towns Fund Accelerator Fund and the recently announced Future High Streets Fund of £6.27m, over £70m has now been secured for Ashfield.
• Successfully bid for £1m funding to improve thermal efficiency ratings of domestic properties, both Council owned and private sector.
• 46% all housing repairs appointments made were kept and 99.37% of emergencies repairs were attended to in government timeframes.
• Supporting high street businesses through the pandemic we have employed Covid Information Officers. From last July to early May 2021 over 3,200 visits were made offering advice and guidance to retailers, small businesses and licenced premises.
• Offered a range of business support and dealt with over 1,270 business support enquiries throughout the year.
• A successful Big Spring Clean campaign in February 2021.
• Street cleanliness in our town centres continue to meet excellent standards with all our town centres maintaining a high grade in street cleanliness.
• We responded to 6,069 reports of anti-social and nuisance behaviour between April 2020 and March 2021. A 38% increase compared to the previous year, impacted by periods of lockdown.
• Support was provided to businesses throughout all phases of the pandemic, through the administration of a variety of business grants. Over 7,300 payments have been made to businesses, with a total value of £30m.
• Received and processed 1,286 test and trace claims, enabling £191,000 to be paid in test and trace grants.
• Making it easier to request and receive Council services on-line

Cllr Zadrozny continues:

“The pandemic has had a huge impact on how the Council delivers its services, but from the beginning we were committed to residents still receiving the high level of service they expect. The Council has fantastic officers who have worked above and beyond during the past year and I want to thank them for all their hard work.”

The next 12 months are set to be an exciting time for the Council with a range of major projects completing and even more starting.

The Leisure Transformation programme will see the improvement works at Lammas and Hucknall Leisure Centres completed. Building work at the new Kirkby Leisure Centre will continue, with everything on track for a 2022 opening.

Housing projects bringing over 70 new social housing homes to the District will start or be completed.

Over £500k in investments will continue in our parks and green spaces, including the opening of the new Hornbeam Park in Kirkby

Moor Market, the new indoor market on Kirkby will open offering a range of artisan traders and fresh barista made coffee.

Projects funded by the Towns Fund and Future High Streets Fund will move forward including the Automated Distribution and manufacturing Centre, Renovating Sutton Community Academy theatre and the creation of a maker space.

Cllr Zadrozny is looking forward to another year of success for the Council, saying:

“The Council has so many amazing projects in the pipeline at the moment. The £62.6mTowns Fund funding is going to have a significant impact on the whole area, our leisure offer is set to some of the best in the area and we are committed to adding new, high quality housing to our housing stock.

“The Council is committed to making Ashfield a nice place to live, work and visit. We are proud of all we achieved last year, and excited for what we will deliver in the next 12 months.”