section: Community Planning

Community Cohesion

To what extent do the communities which share a neighbourhood, and therefore an interest in its improvement, have the ability to work and plan together?

To what extent do the communities which share a neighbourhood, and therefore an interest in its improvement, have the ability to work and plan together?

In more detail

Community cohesion is the extent to which the communities which share a neighbourhood, a city or a country, overlap and have points of common interest.  A neighbourhood has been described, at best, as a ‘community of communities’.   In many neighbourhoods, however, communities may share a physical space... but their members may live separate lives.

The video below presents what a range of people think of community cohesion.  It was made in 2009 and features Hazel Blears who was the Government minister responsible for communities:

Making bridges between communities is one of the most likely ways of improving neighbourhoods.  Remember: communities are not just defined by ethnicity, but by class, age, housing tenure and many other factors and are brought together by many other interests.  The networks you build as part of successful community planning in your neighbourhood are what will make your neighbourhood strong and sustainable.

Key Facts:

Community cohesion is the measure of the extent to which communities which share the same neighbourhood are able to work and plan together to improve it.

Page Links from here

In the toolkit see:

Community Networks and Hubs

Civil Society

Community

 


OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

BIRMINGHAM COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT DEFINITION SHEET This sheet may be reproduced in paper or electromic or any other form but please mention it was made by Chamberlain Forum Limited for Birmingham City Council supported by Department for Communities and Local Government.

created: 2016-06-14 15:28:26 by: admin status: f published

Community Assets

Community assets are the resources you have to make your neighbourhood a better place to live. They are more diverse than some people imagine. But… sometimes what look like assets might turn out to be liabilities? Working out what assets are in your neighbourhood and how they could be better used is a key part of community planning…

Community assets are the resources you have to make your neighbourhood a better place to live. They are more diverse than some people imagine. But... sometimes what look like assets might turn out to be liabilities? Working out what assets are in your neighbourhood and how they could be better used is a key part of community planning...

In more detail

Community assets  are resources communities can use to get things done.  Examples could include:

  • meeting places
  • social networks
  • volunteers
  • land and buildings
  • contracts and businesses
  • business supporters
  • a farmers’ market
  • members' and their enthusiasm and wisdom
  • relationships with the managers of local public services
  • a network of community groups
  • projects which help people share - like timebanks and toobanks
  • community groups.

Some community assets are land and buildings, but most aren’t.  Some are owned, but many aren’t (you can’t legally own a relationship or a network) and some could be managed and not owned and they would still be assets.  Some of the list relate directly to the aims of the community group (which might be to provide a community centre or affordable housing).  Some assets are indirectly related – they earn money which enable you to do other things.  Some community assets are intangible – networks and relationships for example can be vital resources, but they aren’t things you can touch or get valued by an estate agent.  Finally, the assets which one community has in a neighbourhood aren’t necessarily shared by others in the same neighbourhood – unless you have some means for exchanging and sharing them – like a timebank or a toolshare, for example.

Making an Inventory (and Map it)

If you aim to plan and make a better your neighbourhood a better place to live, you might find it useful to make a list (an inventory to use a formal accounting expression) of relevant community assets?  When you do, bear in mind community assets might:

  • include land and buildings but are not just land and buildings
  • be owned by the community, or might be managed by it or simply be usable by it
  • relate to the aim, directly or indirectly, of making the locality a better place
  • include dedicated public servants and local business people who care about the place as much as you
  • be things you can lay your hands on and might also include relationships, understandings and networks
  • include tools, but the skills to use tools can be more important and valuable
  • be owned by a community group or someone else, but not worth much if you have no way of trading and exchanging favours and resources
  • liabilities – that is things that get in the way of doing what you want to do. Community centres can be full of asbestos.  Contracts can be impossible to deliver at a profit.  Trading activities can make a loss.  And relationships can be based on you doing everyone a good turn and never getting one back.

Social Value

When you have made a list of local community assets, you can work out out what value they currently have (to do with how they are being used at the moment).  You can also think about what social value could be added by using assets in different ways (ie how they might be used in future).  Rather than worrying about who (if anyone) owns partocular assets, think about how they could be used to add more social value to the neighbourhood?

Key Facts:

Community assets aren't just land and building, but also relationships, networks, people and skills etc.  If you wan to work out how to make them benefit your neighbourhood then make a list and think about how they could be used in different ways.

Page Links from here

The Locality website explains community assets

You might also be interested in looking up an approach called Asset Based Community Development (ABCD)  and the ABCD Institute which were pioneered by John McKnight and John Kretzmann who wrote Building Communities from the Inside Out: A Path Toward Finding and Mobilizing A Community’s Assets in 1993

And on this site:

Social Value

Community Asset Transfer

Social Capital

Community Hubs and Networks

Community

Community Groups


OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

BIRMINGHAM COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT DEFINITION SHEET This sheet may be reproduced in paper or electromic or any other form but please mention it was made by Chamberlain Forum Limited for Birmingham City Council supported by Department for Communities and Local Government.

created: 2016-06-12 14:47:33 by: admin status: f published

Designated Bodies

The ‘community rights’ in the Localism Act can be exercised by certain designated groups on behalf of the community…

The 'community rights' in the Localism Act can be exercised by certain designated groups on behalf of the community...

In more detail

The Localism Act 2011 designates which sort of community organisations can take on and lead the exercise of the various 'community powers' it sets out.

Neighbourhood Planning/Neighbourhood Development Orders

Neighbourhood planning (including neighbourhood development orders) must be led by the local parish council if one exists.  In places where there is none - as in most urban neighbourhoods - then neighbourhood planning may be led by a 'neighbourhood forum'.  The law says: forums must have at least 21 members; have membership which os representative of the area they cover (including business and public sector representatives); and have a written constitution.  These requirements apply to existing bodies as well as to bodies formed for the purpose of neighbourhood planning.  So, you may find that existing residents' groups and even bodies called neighbourhood forums and accepted by the council as such, do not qualify as designated bodies.  In which case, you will have to set up a new body or change the constitution etc of an existing body in order to have a suitable body to lead on neighbourhood planning.

Assets of Community Value/Right to Bid

Any eligible community or voluntary organisation can nominate land or buildings to be included on the register of assets of community value kept by the council for the purposes of 'Right to Bid'.  To be eligible, groups most be either an unincorporated association (like most residents' associations) with at least 21 members in the council's area; or a parish council, registered charity, indistrial and provident society (which is a form used by cooperatives), a company limited by guarantee or community interest company or a local neighbourhood forum as defined above.  Neither the council, nor profit-making businesses may nominate assets for the register.

When land or buildings which are listed on the register of assets of community value is put up for sale by its owner, then suitably qualified 'community interest groups' have a six month window of opportunity within which to submit bids offers to buy the asset before the landowner is allowed to sell it on the open market.  To be eligible as a community interest group, you must have a local connection with the asset and be: a parish council, a registered charity, a community interest company, a company limited by guarantee or an industrial and provident society.  Neighbourhood forums (unless they are also one of the above) and unincorporated bodies can nominate assets for listing, but cannot exercise the right to bid.

Right to Challenge

Voluntary and community groups, charities, social enterprises, parish councils, local council and fire and rescue authority staff can express interest in running local council services where they believe they can do so differently and better. If the council accepts the written expression of interest (and if it doesn't, it must explain why), this triggers a procurement exercise in which the interested group may take part alongside any other organisation, including profit-making businesses, that are fit to deliver the service.  So, businesses, which cannot trigger the challenge, can nonetheless bid to run the service if the challenge is accepted by the council.

Key Facts:

Parish councils and neighbourhood forums that have been constituted according to a legal minimum can exercise powers relating to neighbourhood planning.  Parish councils, neighbourhood forums and a wide range of other non-profit groups can nominate assets of community value, but neighbourhood forums cannot exercise the subsequent righ to bid if and when it arises.  Parish councils, a wide range of non-profit bodies and groups of staff who work for the council or the fire and rescue service can use the right to challenge the way a public service is run.  All suitably qualified bodies, including profit-making businesses may take part in any procurement exercise arising from a successful challenge.
 

Page Links from here

In this toolkit:

Neighbourhood Planning

Neighbourhood Development Orders

Who Leads on Neighbourhood Planning?

Community Right to Bid

Parish Council

Community Group


OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

BIRMINGHAM COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT DEFINITION SHEET This sheet may be reproduced in paper or electromic or any other form but please mention it was made by Chamberlain Forum Limited for Birmingham City Council supported by Department for Communities and Local Government.

created: 2016-06-07 09:53:35 by: admin status: f published

Life Cycle of a Plan

We mainly think of plans as documents that sit on a bookshelf or a computer server drive. But plans – like butterflies – have a life cycle during which they change shape. The life cycle of a plan is made up of three main stages.

We mainly think of plans as documents that sit on a bookshelf or a computer server drive. But plans - like butterflies - have a life cycle during which they change shape. The life cycle of a plan is made up of three main stages.

In more detail

Plans exist:

As drafts – dealing with possibilities and alternatives. Draft plans are used to engage other people with a stake in the place or project being planned.  They enable the people making the plan to keep track of ideas and other factors affecting the place or the project.  Draft plans facilitate conversation (which is open-ended and aimed at getting ideas and factors identified) and consultation (which is a more formal dialogue aiming to test commitment to particular proposals), a draft plan reaches completion and agreement

As complete and agreed plans – dealing with complete views of future development  and what to do about contingencies (which are things which might happen, but may not).  Agreed plans act as records.  They let everyone with an interest share the same view of what has been agreed in terms of priorities.  And everyone can see the evidence that they have been made on.  Agreed plans provide means of: communication (a plan gives a clear and comprehensible picture of what has been agreed); and coherence (an agreed plan makes clear why it has been agreed and therefore how the plan holds together and makes sense in itself and in relation to any other relevant plans).

As working documents in use– plans are tools.  They define limits and tolerances (which is the leeway around a limit that is acceptable).  Plans describe the way people will behave in terms of a place or a project.  They say what we think we will do in response to contingencies  and unknowns.  At this stage, plans enable : comparison (we can compare what the plan says should or might take place and what actually happens); and control (we can take action in response to contingencies).

Looking after a Plan

The form the plan takes and the skills and relationships needed to use and develop it successfully can vary during its life cycle, for example:

  • During the drafting stage, a neighbourhood plan needs to be open and fluid, growing more formal as it develops so that there is solid evidence to explain why it should be agreed.
  • Before agreeing a neighbourhood plan there needs to be some technical skill and knowledge involved in working out how it fits together and checking it neither contradicts itself or other plans of which it forms part.
  • Agreeing a neighbourhood plan involves a formal process – there needs to be a chance for everyone with a legitimate interest to formally say whether, or not, they agree it.

Using a neighbourhood plan as part of the local planning framework requires professionals with technical skills to make judgements, but it also needs the engagement of the people and organisations that are working within it and decisions on the part of their elected representatives, local councillors.

Key Facts:

Plans are like butterflies - they go through several stages in their life cycle.  The 'six Cs' they need from birth to maturity are:

Conversation and consultation are the key-words when drafting a plan. 

Communication and coherence are the key things when agreeing a plan. 

Comparison and control are important ideas when using a plan in practice.

Page Links from here

In this toolkit:

What is a Plan?

Planning

Community Planning

Spatial Planning


OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

BIRMINGHAM COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT DEFINITION SHEET This sheet may be reproduced in paper or electromic or any other form but please mention it was made by Chamberlain Forum Limited for Birmingham City Council supported by Department for Communities and Local Government.

created: 2016-06-05 10:28:01 by: admin status: f published

Community Networks and Hubs

Some neighbourhoods thrive on change and others seem to decline? One of the factors – perhaps the most important – in this is the local community network and the people and places which help generate it…

Some neighbourhoods thrive on change and others seem to decline? One of the factors - perhaps the most important - in this is the local community network and the people and places which help generate it...

In more detail

Communities and community groups are made up of links between people who share common interests.  Because people may have many interests, communities are also linked to form a kind of network. Which people sometimes call the local 'community network'.

Local Community Network

Community networks vary in terms of their visibility, strength and flexibility (how well they cope with newcomers and other changes) and how inclusive and diverse they are:

  • highly visble community networks are easy to get hold of - whether as a member of the local community, or as a local business or manager of a public service
  • strong community networks don't just focus on one person or one group to support them but are supported by many different people
  • flexibly community networks cope well with change - new communities that come into the area and new managers of local services are quickly absorbed
  • inclusive community networks link a high proportion of local households and businesses
  • diverse community networks link people and communities that are different to each other (young and old; Muslim and Christian; business owners and residents etc).

Places with visible, strong, flexible community networks which are inclusive and diverse tend to improve faster than those without.  They are also more able to deal with setbacks and challenges.  This is because community networks help to create a sense of trust, belonging and connection to local decision-making.  This adds social value; it can also add hard economic value to the area.   In Birmingham, for example, researchers found that neighbourhoods in which more people said they felt involved in local decisions; trusted their neighbours; and felt that different communities co-existed well, were also the neighbourhoods where property prices increased most rapidly.  People - it seems - want to live in neighbourhoods where there is a strong community network.

Mapping your Community Hubs

In any area (either a geographical area or an area of interest) there will be some key people, groups, places or institutions which play a significant part in linking communities and community groups together to make the local community network. These 'network-makers' are sometimes called ‘community hubs’.  It’s usually applied to physical locations, buildings – particularly meeting places - but hubs can be people, or groups, websites, or habits and customs (for example, having a neighbourhood get-together once every couple of months).

Improving the local community network could start with taking stock of the community hubs which help to build it.  Things to bear in mind

  • hubs tend to be general rather than specific, for example – a building that people can go into for a wide range of purposes (and maybe, nothing in particular) rather than somewhere you can only go for one thing.
  • where hubs have a specific formal purpose - such as training, for example, they work in such a way as to enable more general use.  The most valuable part of a training course may be the networking that it enables participants to undertake.
  • calling a thing a community hub, doesn’t make it a community hub. Effective hubs can take on a wide range of forms and belong to different groups in society – they aren’t all local council-run community centres.
  • community hubs are places where communities meet, but they aren't necessarily community-run (and being community-run isn't enough on its own to ensure a place will be a community hub).  Local pubs and shops can act as community hubs.
  • food is a common factor in a lot of hubs – cafes and community lunches etc bring people of different communities together.  Markets and festivals are, likewise, things which people from a wide range of backgrounds find easy to take part in.
  • minority communities tend to have places and activities that relate  to their identity as hubs – specialist shops, places of worship, cultural activities etc.
  • regularity and predictability matter – if people are used to something happening on the first Thursday of the month, for example, it helps it to become established as a hub.
  • people who act as hubs are not necessarily who you might think of as 'community leaders'.  They are enablers of information sharing and joint action, rather than necessarily being the leaders of it.

Increasing 'Hubbiness'

As well as thinking about what the hubs  are in your neighbourhood, it can make sense to consider ‘hubbiness’ - as an adjective.  How ‘hubby’, for example, are your community group meetings?  Perhaps you can’t always be ‘hubby’, but you might be able to include times when it is easier for newcomers and outsiders to take part; space on the agenda for information exchange; and you might have people in the group whose job it is to welcome people in?

Key Facts:

The local community network is the sum of the links within and between communities that share an area.  A visible, strong, flexible network that is inclusive and diverse supports the development of the neighbourhood in the right directions.  Community networks are generated and supported by 'hubs' - which can be buildings, groups, people, websites or ways of doing things.  Hubs are things which bring people together and enable them to link.  If you want to improve your neighbourhood, start by thinking about your community network and the hubs that generate it.

Page Links from here

Community Network Analysis is a series of videos from the Orton Family Foundation in Vermont USA - it is presented as part of a tool called Community Heart and Soul' but also makes general points relating to community networks.

In this toolkit:

Civil Society

Community

Social Capital

Social Value


OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

BIRMINGHAM COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT DEFINITION SHEET This sheet may be reproduced in paper or electromic or any other form but please mention it was made by Chamberlain Forum Limited for Birmingham City Council supported by Department for Communities and Local Government.

created: 2016-05-14 15:40:05 by: admin status: f published

Neighbourhood Statements and Policies

Communities, businesses and public agencies have been drawing up policies and plans for imrpving neighbourhoods since before the Localism Act set up a statutory neighbourhood planning process. What your neighbourhood needs might be a plan of how these different groups will work cooperatively to make a better place to live and work?

Communities, businesses and public agencies have been drawing up policies and plans for imrpving neighbourhoods since before the Localism Act set up a statutory neighbourhood planning process. What your neighbourhood needs might be a plan of how these different groups will work cooperatively to make a better place to live and work?

In more detail

Neighbourhood statements andpolicies can describe how local people and business want to see the area develop in terms of social, environmental and economic well-being.  They can cover what you want and be much broader than the statutory neighbourhood plan, which deals with how local land is used.   Unlike a statutory neighbourhood plan, it will not be legally enforceable and will not bind newcomers to the neighbourhood, but it could be even more influential.

Neighbourhood policies might cover things like:

  • Keeping local services and facilities open despite reductions in funding
  • Community-led initiatives and projects to improve the neighbourhood
  • Attracting businesses and enabling business growth
  • Helping local businesses to create apprenticeship and employment opportunities
  • Getting public services to work better together and avoid duplication
  • Setting up a neighbourhood company
  • Forming an inter-faith forum to enable different communities to appreciate each other
  • Improving the image of the area
  • Looking after isolated older people in the neighbourhood
  • Steps to reduce vehicle crime
  • Enabling ‘social prescribing’ by the local health service
  • Attracting charitable funding for local projects
  • Road safety
  • Getting local schools and youth services to work together better
  • Organising local festivals and promoting live music and drama in the neighbourhood
  • Care and play facilities for disable youngsters
  • Busting local litterers and discouraging dumping
  • Helping local food businesses to recycle surplus food
  • Promoting local shops and traders by developing a community currency.

The content depends on the opportunities and threats your neighbourhood faces and the strengths your communities, businesses and local agencies bring.

Title and status

You might already have a neighbourhood development plan and it might be called something else.  In country areas, it might be called a Parish Plan and be led by a parish council.  If you set up a community council in your area, the neighbourhood development plan would be its priority list.  If you produced a neighbourhood development plan across a whole city it would do what a thing called a ‘Sustainable Community Strategy’ was supposed to do.  These are documents which no longer exist, but which councils used to have to produce to explain how they would meet the brief of improving local economic, social and environmental wellbeing.

Neighbourhood policies and development plans are unlikely to be adopted by the council as a local planning document because it will cover such a wide range of subjects which are not related to local land use.  However, in producing a neighbourhood development plan, you will inevitably produce statements about how land should be used.   If your plan is a serious, balanced document setting out an achievable set of actions (rather than just a wish list), these statements will form a coherent set of land use policies.

Having made a neighbourhood development plan, you could extract the land use policies and implications from it and present them to the council as a local planning document (which they could adopt as part of the Local Planning Framework).  Or, more likely, you could integrate the production of a community-led (non-statutory) neighbourhood development plan and a (statutory) neighbourhood plan: do both at the same time.

Key Facts:

Voluntary neighbourhood policies, statements and plans do not have statutory power and do not bind organisations and people who do not sign up to them (including, for example newcomer communities or developers moving into the area).  They can, hwoever, be written how you want and apply to exactly the issues you want to cover.  They can be useful ways of focusing on the common good and cooperative working.  It could be that you produce a set of community policies relating to the way the area is served; the way communities can work together etc. as you make, and alongside, a statutory spatial neighbourhood plan.

Page Links from here

Community Planning

Neighbourhood Planning

 


OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

BIRMINGHAM COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT DEFINITION SHEET This sheet may be reproduced in paper or electromic or any other form but please mention it was made by Chamberlain Forum Limited for Birmingham City Council supported by Department for Communities and Local Government.

created: 2016-05-06 12:58:07 by: admin status: f published