Issued by City of York Council
City of York Council’s Cabinet will be asked to consider proposals to the council’s City and Environmental Services (CES) structure to reflect the changing shape and funding of local government, at a meeting on Tuesday 12 February 2013.
Over the past four years the council has implemented changes to the structure of the authority, stemming from the Organisation Review. Since the proposals were agreed in 2009, significant changes have taken place in local government regionally and nationally.
These changes present both a significant challenge to the organisation in terms of maintaining services within decreasing financial resources, but also opportunities to bring together services in a structure more suited to supporting all council priorities.
It is for these reasons that proposals have been developed to reduce costs, introduce a more coherent and efficient management structure and to streamline and re-align the CES directorate structure to focus on priorities such as economic growth, via regeneration, income generation through new ways of working and thus strengthening the services future to protect key services.
To support this, Cabinet will be asked to consider a recommendation that will take the senior management structure of three Assistant Directors and 11 Heads of Service, to a leaner model of two Assistant Director posts and five Heads of Service.
Taking into account that the review is to be delivered in two stages; the detailed changes for the preferred option for Phase 1, which is an interim transitional arrangement, will be implemented during 2013/14 and a saving of £262,000 is anticipated to be delivered in that year. The reduction in posts represents savings of £1.048 million by 2014/15.
Councillor James Alexander, Labour Leader of City of York Council, said: “The council is facing a financially challenging period due to government funding cuts and I recognise that we need to do all we can to secure essential services.
“I would like to pay tribute to staff across the council who continue to maintain a high standard of work and commitment to our communities despite the ongoing financial challenges and uncertainty.”
Darren Richardson, Director of City and Environmental Services, at City of York Council, said: “We know that our staff are our greatest asset and will be instrumental in delivering the council’s priorities so greater investment in staff development at all levels and encouraging a less hierarchical, more innovative way of working will be vital to enable us to deliver our priorities for the city and its communities.”
Consultation on the proposed restructure of the City and Environmental Services directorate has been on-going since November 2012 with employees and trade union representatives.
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