Content

 

10.1

This report provides
an overview of progress to deliver the second round of the Economic
Recovery Fund (ERF) now that the application and scoring phases are
complete. The report lists the outcomes of the scoring process for
all applications and provides information about the geographical
spread and make-up of the areas that applied for funding. The
report marks the point at which ERF moves from the application and
scoring phases into the contracting phase, which will enable
successful projects to start delivering improvements and activities
in their areas.

 

 

 

 

10.2

RESOLVED
UNANIMOUSLY: That Finance Committee:-

 

 

 

 

 

1.    
Approves Sheffield City Council (“SCC”)
to allocate funding to areas offered over £50,000 (up to
£200,000) and, subject to due diligence and other checks being
undertaken to the satisfaction of the Director of Economic
Development, Culture and Skills, for SCC to enter into a funding
agreement with an appropriate lead organisation for each of the
areas listed in the table below:

 

Project Area

Funding Offer (final figures
TBC)

Crookes

£90,000

Darnall

£100,000

Harborough Avenue

£70,000

Heeley & Newfield Greens

£100,000

London Road

£142,355

Northern Avenue

£66,818

Spital Hill

£74,470

Westfield

£71,456

Woodhouse

£70,000

 
2.    
Notes the areas listed in the table below have been
allocated funding of up to £50,000 under the general
delegation to officers, subject to due diligence and other checks
being satisfied:
 

Project Area

Funding Offer (final figures
TBC)

Abbeydale

£37,682

Banner
Cross

£36,198

Broomhill

£40,250

Chapeltown

£49,644

Ecclesfield

£38,857

Firth
Park

£39,932

Greenhill

£50,000

Hackenthorpe

£49,573

Hillsborough

£46,022

Infirmary Road

£32,116

Lowedges

£37,321

Middlewood

£48,971

Stannington

£49,962

Walkley

£35,052

 

 

 

 

10.3

Reasons for Decision

 

 

 

 

 

10.3.1

The nature of ERF
means that the projects that have been allocated funding have been
through a rigorous process, both during the development of the
applications and in scoring.  The ERF
Steering Group are collectively supportive of the outcomes of this
process and in the recommendations presented here. 

 

 

 

 

10.3.2

The successful
projects have been informed of the outcome in principle and are
awaiting Committee approval in order to move forward.  Delaying or changing these recommendations may
have an impact on the Council’s reputation in these areas and
would impact on the delivery of the intended outcomes of the
ERF.  

 

 

 

 

10.3.3

The recommendations
here allow the Council to continue its work to engage with and
empower local businesses and high streets and support their
recovery following the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic and
subsequent cost of living crisis.

 

 

 

 

10.3.4

The intended outcome
is to have a programme that meets the ERF objectives through the
successful delivery of the proposals in these 23 projects as well
as the Council’s Delivery Plan objectives.

 

 

 

 

10.4

Alternatives Considered and Rejected

 

 

 

 

Programme

 

10.4.1

As noted, a range of
options for delivering ERF2 were considered over summer and autumn
2022.  Several alternative ways of
delivering the second round of funding were considered as part of
this process and proposals were made in relation to changing and
improving the second round of funding. 
These were approved by the EDSP Committee at its meeting on
19th October 2022.  This
approach has subsequently been enacted so the proposals here are
the outcome of an agreed process. 

 

 

 

 

 

Outcomes

 

10.4.2

Because the Fund was
oversubscribed, Steering Group had to look at ways of managing that
and ensuring funding offers were within the available budget and
made in a fair way (as described in appendix 1). 

 

 

 

 

Alternatives to that included
the following, but the agreed approach was felt by the Steering
Group to be a balanced, individualised
and fair way of dealing with the budget pressure that took into
account the specific elements within each project and strengths and
weaknesses.  It was felt that any
blanket measures would cut across these nuances and lead to
outcomes unreflective of their scoring judgements.
 

Alternative

Rationale

Why rejected

Making
a blanket cut to all projects that passed scoring

To
reduce the overall funding ask to keep within the budget

Projects had different strengths and weaknesses and this tactic
felt unfair and arbitrary to the Steering Group

Raising
threshold at which projects would have passed

To
reduce the number of projects that would receive funding

Project
that passed scoring not receiving funding – Steering Group
wanted to maximise the number of areas that could benefit from the
Fund

To
remove specific types of activity from all budgets

To
reduce the overall funding ask and limit specific
activity

This
would have potentially been applied unequally across projects,
depending on whether they had included the activity in their
proposals or not