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BLACKPOOL COUNCIL

EXECUTIVE MEMBER REPORT TO THE COUNCIL

Report of the Cabinet Member for /

Culture and Communities

at the Council meeting held on / 23rd September 2009
This report provides the opportunity to report to the Council the latest developments on various matters relating to the Culture and Communities portfolio.
Sport and LeisureDuring the month of July, a number of hugely successful county, regional and national sporting events took place in Blackpool Stanley Park and Blackpool Sports Centre hosted the Lancashire Disability Youth Games, National Disability Athletics Championships and Blackpool ‘Olympic’ Youth Games, which involved all Blackpool Primary, Special and Secondary Schools, with in excess of 4,000 children participating.
The Cycling Events programme has gone from strength to strength, being described by British Cycling Regional Events Manager as being arguably the most prolific and exciting in the UK. The Tour of Blackpool Cycle Festival took place over three days in July and is now the largest festival of its kind within the country, providing a series of national and international youth, women’s and men’s races. The Grand Prix of British cycling ‘Nocturne Series’ was also held in Blackpool for the first time, with the two other venues being London and Edinburgh. In excess of 6,000 spectators attended watching a spectacle of hoteliers’ races to world-class competition. The main elite race was won by Olympic Gold medallist Ed Clancy MBE. In addition to the world class events, the Manchester to Blackpool cycle Race proved a huge success with a record entry of in excess of 8,000 participants. Blackpool really is starting to get the name of the ‘home of cycling’.
‘Kids Stuff’ is the Fylde Coast summer children and young people’s activity programme, which provide a comprehensive and broad base of activities for all ages, interests, abilities and backgrounds. The programme has been going from strength to strength with indications that this year participating will be at a record level of in excess of 40,000 visits. Activities include free swimming, arts awards, sports camps, children’s play schemes, play ranger activities, library activities and events.
Blackpool Sports Centre
The joined-up and integrated working relationship with NHS Blackpool is demonstrated and reflected by the fact that they have provided in excess of £300,000 into the upgrading of in particular the health and fitness facilities at Blackpool Sports Centre.
The bar and viewing area has been recently converted into a brand new Group Exercise Class Studio and a dedicated Spinning Studio, both with new air conditioning, flooring, ceilings and lighting. Phase two of the work has started which is resulting in the major refurbishment of the existing class studio area to extend the current Fitness Room from 136m² to 300m². This is scheduled to finish mid September where Phase three will start to refurbish facilities, which will create a Mental Health Day Care provision, which to the services’ knowledge is the first facility of its kind in a leisure centre.
The new facilities will not only facilitate the potential increase in general visits related to physical activity by in excess of 25,000, but also provide more appropriate and better facilities for increasing cardiac, respiratory, clinical and general GP referral programmes.
Parks and Green Environment
Green Flag Success
Stanley Park, Louie Horrocks Recreation Ground and Watson Road Park have all maintained their prestigious Green Flag award status and have recently been joined by Salisbury Woodland. Formally Salisbury Woodland Gardens, it is an important ecological site managed by the Ranger Service. The sites scored their highest marks in the history of the scheme, reflecting the ongoing improvements undertaken by the service and its partners.
Claremont Park Playground
The third and final phase of the restoration of Claremont Park playground has now been completed with a full range of equipment for children of all ages. The total cost of the scheme was approximately £34,000, which has been met from commuted sum funding (the contributions made by developers towards addressing the recreational needs resulting from new developments in an area).
Moor Park Memorial Arboretum
Moor Park Community and Memorial Arboretum was officially opened on 26th June 2009. During the opening ceremony, which was attended by veterans and dignitaries from across the country, a commemorative memorial plinth was unveiled by Brigadier W Aldridge CBE. Sixteen further memorial plinths were unveiled by the Deputy Mayor of Blackpool and the Mayors of Fylde and Wyre as acknowledgement of the sacrifice given by our countries’ service men and women.
Arts and Heritage
Regeneration Arts Programme – Dance Residency
Over the past two months as part of the Regeneration Arts Project, dance artist Rebecca Melvin has been carrying out a dance residency. Rebecca's work is informed by exploring unused spaces in the area that we live. She uses film and visual art alongside dance to comment on the area she is exploring. Rebecca has been working with the Reassurance Plus Dream Scheme at St Peters and the Coast group, which is part of Drugline, to develop new work about Blackpool. The residency is due to end in September with the launch of two new films made with the two groups she has been working with.
Grundy Art Gallery – ‘Rank’ Exhibition
The present contemporary exhibition 'Rank' has seen good visitor attendance with 3,429 visitors from the opening of the show on 25th July up to 26th August. Visitor feedback reveals that over half of gallery visitors are travelling into Blackpool especially to view the exhibition, having been attracted by the press coverage the exhibition received in the Guardian, Observer and Telegraph newspapers whilst showing at its previous venue. The Blackpool showing attracted an impressive article in The Times.
Heritage Open Days
Blackpool Council (in partnership with Blackpool Civic Trust) put together a fantastic programme for this year’s Heritage Open Days (10th to 13th September). The programme now features over thirty venues and events, including several newcomers, such as Funny Girls, The Guard’s Club and St Stephen’s on the Cliff. The strength and variety of our programme has been recognised at national level with Blackpool hosting the North West Regional Launch and being featured in national research demonstrating good practice.
Adult and Community Learning
The Adult and Community Learning Division has exceeded its targets by 21% with a total of over 3000 learners engaged onto a wide range of adult and community learning programmes between August 2008 and July 2009. The number of learners supported on public courses through low or much reduced fees remains high at 72%, the number of learners aged over 55 was just over 55%. A full self-assessment report is produced in October that provides a detailed analysis of performance with grading of leadership and management, capacity to improve, quality and curriculum. This will be available for inspection by OFSTED. The Service’s last full inspection was in January 2006, therefore another inspection is expected during the forthcoming academic year.
Informal Adult Learning Pledge
The Council has ‘signed’ the Informal Adult Learning Pledge in response to the Government White Paper ‘The Learning Revolution’. Published in March 2009, it called for support for a new movement to revitalise learning for learning’s sake and to ensure that all agencies acknowledge their role in this from sports, health and leisure to museums, libraries, archives, schools and voluntary groups. There is a key role for Local Authorities in co-ordinating opportunities within the public and third sector for informal adult learning, in supporting joint working, in opening up spaces and in empowering individuals to facilitate their own learning. Digital skills for older people are also seen as crucial. As part of the ‘Learning Revolution’, the Government is planning a nationwide Festival of Learning for the autumn. The service has already planned events as part of the bigger ‘Wordpool’ festival and as part of Family Learning week in October that will contribute to this. All these events will be promoted nationally, regionally and locally.
Libraries
Libraries are continuing to provide a range of successful activities to encourage visitors, these include the introduction of monthly library quiz nights and bi-monthly teenage band nights at Central Library and a programme of summer activities including this years 'Summer Reading Challenge', so far showing a increase in participation over last years figures. Plans are currently being finalised for this years ‘Wordpool’ festival.
Forthcoming improvements to the ICT offer in libraries include the introduction of improved capacity using wireless technology and a full review of the library web pages to make it easier to use library on-line services.
A joint UKOnline bid between Libraries and the Adult Learning service has been successful and will provide additional resources to help support informal learning based in libraries and hopefully increase referral into more formal and accredited learning programmes
Reassurance Plus
The Reassurance Plus teams continue to provide a multi agency service to residents in the South, Central and Grange priority neighbourhoods of Blackpool. This month, the teams have taken advantage of the warmer weather by organising outdoor events and activities to bring the community together.

Official Opening of the Refurbished ‘South Park’ at Talbot and Brunswick

Local residents turned out in force, on 20th August, to watch Tracey Dawson (widow of the well-known comedian Les Dawson) officially open the refurbished ‘South Park’ next to the Reassurance Plus office on Gorton Street. This project, initiated by members of the SureStart Parents Forum, received funding and support from Reassurance Plus, the Children’s Centre Locality Partnership Board and SureStart. The launch of the park was a great success with free activities for children, including face painting and circus skills and a great turnout from partner agencies such as Advice Link, Blackpool and Fylde College, DrinkAware, the Fire Service and NHS Blackpool. Local children will benefit from having a safe and exciting play area and a dedicated group of volunteers from the SureStart Parents Forum have been empowered to assist in improving their own neighbourhood.
Grange Park Reassurance Plus staff, working in partnership with Muir Group Housing Association, Police and community volunteers, invited over 20 children from Grange Park to work with a professional graffiti artist from Zap Graffiti Arts to paint a white hording surrounding a new development on Tarnbrook Drive.
The young people, some of who are known to graffiti the area, were asked to plan and design words to form a poem, which will be put together on boards on the hording in order to promote respect for the area and discourage vandalism. The young people who took part in the course, held on 21st August 2009, showed a great deal of respect for the instructors and the project and admitted that the course had given them a new perspective on the difference between art and vandalism. Reassurance Plus staff hope that giving the youngsters the opportunity to channel their creative energy into a positive project will raise their self-esteem and deter vandalism and unwanted graffiti in the area.
Neighbourhood Improvement
The Home Owner Advice Team provides advice and assistance to residents to help them improve their housing conditions. Residents are also able to access help in claiming benefits that may be due to them through this team and between 1st May and 31st July 2009 have been able to increase annual income of eligible benefit claims by over £165,000 through advice and assistance. The team check that the household is accessing all the relevant benefits funding available to them and provide assistance in completing the necessary paperwork.
Over the three months, 352 enquiries were made to the service resulting in 60 home improvement, energy efficiency and emergency heating measures being implemented. There was an estimated resultant annual carbon dioxide saving of over 100 tonnes. The team has also contributed to further reductions in carbon dioxide totalling approximately 83 tonnes through 117 referrals for property insulation.
Community Safety and DrugsCrime and Anti Social Behaviour
Current year to date figures show that all crime has decreased by 0.5% compared to last year. Current year to date figures show that the number of incidents of anti social behaviour reported to the police has reduced by 9.7% against a 4% locally set reduction target. This follows on from reductions achieved last financial year when our local target of 2% was surpassed and a 7% reduction was achieved.
Perception of Anti-Social Behaviour and Fear of Crime
The National Place Survey data has now been published and we are able to provide comparative data analysis with both other Lancashire Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships and with other Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships, who are considered similar to ourselves in England and Wales. Most Similar Groups are calculated on being areas with similar geographical, demographic and socio-economic situations.
Although the 24.2% anti social behaviour perception rate for Blackpool is slightly above the mean average of Lancashire (19.8%), Blackpool falls in line with the mean average of the other national Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships who are considered most similar to ourselves (24.1%)
Alley gates
The installation of alley gates continues and the 1000th gate will be erected in Blackpool by the end of this year. To date 403 alleyways have been gated since 2003.