Final decision is reached on the High Wycombe Community Governance Review
At its full Council meeting today (18 September), Buckinghamshire Council approved the recommendations, made by the Standards and General Purposes Committee on 10 September, that the Council should not establish a town council for the whole of the unparished High Wycombe area but rather strengthen the current governance arrangements so that they can deliver improvements in the High Wycombe area.
Councillor David Goss is Chair of Standards and General Purposes Committee. He said:
“Again, I would like to thank those residents and stakeholders in High Wycombe who shared their views with us. Despite considerable efforts to encourage local people to take part in the consultation exercise, including a copy of the survey with a pre-paid response envelope delivered to every household, it was clear from the very low response that there was just not a widespread appetite for creating a Town Council.
We were also very conscious that only 1.9% of the total local population (55,000 people) were prepared to meet the costs of a new local council and the committee concluded that did not give us a mandate to impose additional taxation on Wycombe residents.
We did however recognise that there was a general consensus amongst those who replied that residents want to see improvements in High Wycombe. Our next steps will be to work with the High Wycombe Town Committee to ensure it is in a better position to respond to local issues."
The final, agreed, recommendations can be found on page 51 (item 7) of the Council agenda.