Care must be taken that a key council support service’s “physical presence” is not lost to North Halifax communities if it is brought in-house.

It is one of the factors senior Calderdale councillors are asked to take into consideration when they are asked to reconfigure the borough’s neighbourhood teams, which help keep communities safe.

The service includes staff who liaise with partner services including the police and deal with issues ranging from dealing with issues ranging from illegal fly-tipping to anti-social behaviour.

It also includes staff who liaise with community groups on litter picks and community clean-ups, for example.

Mixenden, in one of the council wards affected.

placeholder image — Mixenden, in one of the council wards affected.

They also offer housing support and advice on issues including employment, benefits, health and debt management.

For most of Calderdale this is done in-house already, but arrangements for four wards – Mixenden, Ovenden, Warley and Northowram and Shelf, which is on the Bradford border – are different.

Cabinet councillors are told the service is delivered there as a commissioned service by North Halifax Partnership, to a council “in-house” model of delivery.

The senior councillors, which meet at Halifax Town hall on Monday, September 14, are asked to agree to take the £169,510 annual arrangement back in-house.

Bringing it in-house will bring that budget into an overall £801,300 pot across the borough, according to the briefing papers.

Although given options of keeping the current arrangement, outsourcing the service for the other areas of Calderdale, they are recommended to bring the arrangements for North Halifax in-house.

Bringing the service in-house will tighten a consistent approach across the borough, will bring it under the scope of a full service review to ensure alignment with available resources and focus on delivery of new corporate priorities, Cabinet member are told.

They are warned care must be taken to ensure that the North Halifax wards do not miss out.

Impacts identified by officers are, noting some of the wards have higher levels of deprivation compared to the rest of the borough, that by moving the Neighbourhood Team out of a local community organisation which is based at a local community asset – Mixenden Activity Centre – “we could be moving services further away from a disadvantaged community.”

To address this, “efforts will be made to retain a physical presence of the Neighbourhood Team within the North Halifax team ward areas to mitigate this impact,” say officers in the briefing paper.

North Halifax Partnership is a community-led charity that brings people and organisations together to improve health, wellbeing and opportunities.