David Edwards/Carol Young to share an update on the Communication & Engagement Sub-Group.
Minutes:
Carol Young, the Policy and Partnerships Manager at Cheshire East Council attended the virtual meeting and provided a verbal update to the Board. She reported that the Sub-Group had met twice and the main areas the group has focused on are the Terms of Reference and the priorities going forward. The main priority was to provide support for the development of the TIP, working closely with Jane Dalton to engage as many people and stakeholders as possible.
The second priority
was looking at whether or not the right platforms were in place for
sharing information including a suitable web presence.
The Crewe Town Council’s
website was providing a short-term solution with the Cheshire East
site linking to the Towns Council site, however the medium to
longer term plan was to develop a bespoke website. Crewe Town
Council had kindly agreed to procure that on behalf of the Town
Board with some funding from the Capacity Fund.
The third priority was thinking about a Communications Plan so everyone was signed up to the same messages, any press releases were co-ordinated and that the Crewe Town branding was being used appropriately. Looking forward, the group was also starting to consider how it might set out a vision for the future. The Board was asked to provide any feedback as to whether or not the Sub-Group was moving in the right direction and if there were any areas that the Sub-Group should be looking at which it currently wasn’t.
Jane Dalton had to leave the virtual meeting prior to consideration of the item. She provided a short written update on consultation advising that a consultation matrix had been developed which the Communications and Engagement Sub-Group had access and contributed to. This was to help ensure that consultation was as inclusive and thorough as possible. Many conversations were well under way with plans in place for further stakeholder organisations, community groups and businesses within the plan.
Reverend David
Edwards, the Chairman of the Sub-Group also updated the Board
verbally stating that a substantial amount of work had already been
undertaken by officers and he thanked them for this. The current challenge related to the resources
required in producing, implementing and monitoring a Communication
Plan. It was clear without the necessary resources it would
be very challenging to build a robust communication and engagement
campaign and as a result there may need to be a request made to the
Board to release a small amount of capacity funding. The
positive press releases from Cheshire East Council in relation to
the investment in the town were encouraging but the ideal situation
would have been for the Crewe Town Board to have had a campaign
highlighting the positive work of the TIP which had worked in
conjunctions with the Council’s recent press
releases. It was felt that community digital engagement was
pivotal to the success of the TIP as well as having an engaging
website and engaging social media platform was also vital to the
Board’s success.
There was a request for photographs and pen pictures of the Board members to be provided and as reported earlier Crewe Town Council had agreed to procure the funding for a bespoke website. The Sub-Group was in the process of submitting a brief to local website suppliers and it was anticipated by the next virtual meeting a supplier would be appointed.
RESOLVED
That the update be noted.