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Thursday 20 November 2014

The great S106 cash give-away

The District Council's regular information brochure is out: the winter edition has been sent to all households, although only the summer edition is currently available online:
www.eastdevon.gov.uk/edc

There are a lot of areas covered - although the East Devon Alliance blog wryly notes one particular issue that is missing:

Oddly, EDDC’s latest edition of their glossy propaganda brochure, ‘Connect’ , doesn’t mention the Knowle at all. Should it be renamed, ‘Disconnect’ ??


Looking at one double-page spread, it does indeed look impressive as to what developers, through their S106 contributions, are doing to 'invest' in popular facilities in the District.

However, there have been questions raised about the nature of these S106 contributions:

When is a “giveaway” not a give away?

21 December 2013

When newspapers refer to the consultation about how to use “Section 106″ money for sports facilities in Sidmouth. EDDC is NOT giving away £250,000. This money has been paid to Sidmouth, via EDDC, to compensate them for the concreting over of large parts of Sidmouth by developers. It is money Sidmouth deserves but it is not a give away by anyone. You don’t think developers would give money away.

Oh, and the money has been sitting in EDDC’s bank account for a long time before it gets spent, earning interest that they don’t distribute and if they don’t use it within a given time the developet can ask for it back – and this does happen. There is no such thing as a free lunch!



Of course, the District Council would hope to get a substantial amount of S106 cash from whoever bought Knowle. How much would that be and would 'the local community' be asked how and where it should be spent...?

Lastly, how many of these outdoor gyms are actually being used - apart from Councillors that is...?

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