Update on place making project

You may be aware that the council is carrying out a place making project looking at our council buildings that deliver, or have the potential to deliver, general face-to-face services to the public. This includes exploring the possibility of bringing services together under one roof where the public can speak face-to-face with an advisor, access a library, computers and bookable rooms.

Opportunities for communities

New approaches to how buildings are operated could help ensure we have good quality, well used facilities within local communities offering modern and flexible facilities to meet the needs of residents and our employees.

There could also be opportunities for communities to take over the running of some buildings – such as by leasing them, community asset transfer or looking at opportunities with community planning partners and others. Similar arrangements have been put in place in other parts of the country.

In October, elected members agreed further local engagement would be carried out on a community-by-community basis, including proposals that:

• officers develop an outline business case to present options and costings for the creation of six core library and area hubs
• officers consider alternative service delivery models at some existing libraries, community centres and village halls – including Haddington and Dunbar town houses - in partnership with local communities
• work takes place to establish the feasibility of relocating North Berwick Youth Project to a former nursery adjacent to North Berwick Community Centre
• assess the feasibility of creating a publicly accessible list of all community facilities available in East Lothian, in conjunction with our community partners

You can read more about the project here.

No imminent changes

We know that there is a significant level of interest in this from colleagues across our organisation and that there are number of employees who work in some of the buildings that could be used differently in future. The work between now and the Council report being presented later in the year is to explore feasibility of these proposals.

It remains the case that no decisions on proposals for any of these buildings have been made at this time with no imminent changes planned.

Colleagues have a huge role to play in this process to ensure we have great, modern buildings from which to work and deliver services to our customers. Team managers from a range of services including Connected Communities, Libraries and Museums are involved in fortnightly meetings as part of this process and will keep their staff updated.

The place making project team is currently planning further engagement activities which will give communities and employees the opportunity to be fully involved in influencing the way forward.

In the meantime, if you have any queries or comments please get in touch by emailing the project team placemakingproject@eastlothian.gov.uk

Tom Reid, Head of Infrastructure

Eamon John, Head of Communities and Partnerships