Local Council Comments on Planning Applications
(District Council) At Planning Services Standing Scrutiny Panel it has been raised that local council’s, in responding to consultation on planning applications, had on occasions requested that in the case where they had raised no objections and requested that it be reported to the relevant area planning committee, they were in fact being dealt with under officer delegated powers.
Under delegated powers, there is no such provision for such applications to be reported to area plans committees. The delegated agreement makes it clear that there are two provisions that determine applications are reported to planning committees where it involves local council comments. These are:
The first of the above regularly trigger applications going to area plans committees, whereas the second is on occasion a trigger, because local council’s appear to be a little less forthcoming in stating support for development and more comfortable in stating no objection. This has worked well for a number of years and should delegated authority be changed so that a “no objection” with a request that it be reported to area plans committee, actually goes to committee, then this will not only add to the length of items on agendas but will impact on NI157 indicator performance for turnaround time of planning applications.
Officers advice is that local council’s could provide a more positive response (“support”) where necessary, subject to justifying this opinion and also be reminded that they can approach a District Councillor of the relevant area planning committee to request a planning application be reported to that area plans committee within the first 4 weeks of notification.
Minutes:
The Committee received a report from Mr N Richardson, Assistant Director of Planning and Economic Development, regarding Local Council’s comments on Planning Applications.
At the Planning Services Scrutiny Standing Panel on 11 October 2010 members suggested that local councils, responding to consultations on planning applications, had, on occasion, requested that where they had raised no objections and asked for an application to be reported to the relevant planning committee, the application in fact had been dealt with under delegated powers.
Under delegated powers, there was no such provision for these applications to be reported to planning committees. The delegated agreement made it clear that there were two provisions that determined applications were reported to planning committees, where it involved local councils comments. They were:
(a) Applications recommended for approval contrary to an objection from a local council which were material to the planning merits of the proposal; and
(b) Applications recommended for refusal but where there was support from the local council and no other overriding planning consideration necessitates refusal.
The first of the above (a) regularly triggered applications going to area plans committees, whereas the second (b) was occasionally a trigger, because local councils appeared to be a little less forthcoming in stating support for development and more comfortable in stating no objection.
Officers advised that local councils could provide a more positive response where necessary, subject to justifying this opinion and also they can approach a District Councillor of the relevant area planning committee to request a planning application be reported to that area plans committee within the first four weeks of notification.
Members said that elements of applications sometimes required a comment.
It was suggested that local councils should state the reasons for supporting or objecting to an application. A local council could ask a district councillor to “call-in” an application.
RESOLVED:
That the report concerning Local Council’s Comments on Planning Applications be noted.