STROUD District Council leader, Steve Lydon, shares some of his schedule from last week and the week to come.

Stroud on TV

Over the past few months, housing officers from Stroud District Council have been filmed for a new series of the BBC One show The Housing Enforcers.

The series started this week and continues throughout February and March.

If you’d like to see some of the hands-on work of the council’s housing officers, which includes working with a tenant who has dementia, getting rid of a houseful of fleas and how we are working with older residents in our sheltered units, the show is on at 9.15am on weekdays.

Our officers will be featuring in 14 of the 20 episodes.

You can also catch up on missed episodes on BBC iPlayer.

Hopefully you’ll find it an interesting insight into some of the council’s day-to-day work.

Wednesday, February 22 Leading Places Seminar

Alongside David Hagg, I attended a seminar organised by the University of Gloucestershire as part of a national programme exploring the key challenges and how to face up to them in our local area ie across Gloucestershire.

It was pleasing that some of our local businesses were there giving their perspective to public bodies on the need to work together on topics such as housing and skills.

Thursday, February 23 – Council Meeting, Ebley Mill

At the start of tonight’s meeting a presentation and reception was held for Sandra Cowley, who recently retired after 30 years service at the council.

Sandra started her career as an accounting technician and became head of finance and business services.

As you’ll no doubt be aware from press headlines, local government finances are a dynamic and challenging role and we’ve been very fortunate in Stroud to have Sandra’s excellent financial management for so long.

Councillors who have worked with Sandra over a number of years were grateful to have the opportunity to wish her well on her travels.

As I mentioned last week the council finalised the overall bills for the district’s households as the figures from parish and town councils, Gloucestershire Police and the county council have been agreed and incorporated so an average property’s annual bill will increase from £1,609.54 to £1,667.41.

Bills will be sent out in the middle of March so if you want to receive yours by email rather than in the post, send an email to ebilling@stroud.gov.uk by the end of this week and we’ll be in touch.

So far 7,500 residents have signed up for electronic billing.

Tuesday, February 28  - SDC Investment and Development Panel

Whilst key decisions are taken by the council and its committees, much work also goes on behind the scenes.

This panel is all-party and works with key members of staff to look at the ongoing developments across Stroud such as Brimscombe Port and Littlecombe.

It reviews progress and explores how best to resolve any problems that may occur.

It will be a critical group in determining how best to implement the new capital programme agreed by council recently.