Sustainable Community Strategy – The background

Leicestershire Together published its first Community Strategy in 2003. The strategy focused on priorities for local people, identified through a range of community participation activities including a series of focus groups, young persons Citizens Jury and a quality of life questionnaire through the Citizens Panel. The strategy outlined how local organisations and partnerships would work together to tackle these issues.

A review of the Strategy took place in 2005, following which a revised document was published. The revised strategy was informed by the following consultation exercises:

• A follow-up Quality of Life questionnaire through the Citizens Panel
• A survey of Parish Councils and Meetings
• Focus groups for young & older people, businesses and people living in rural areas
• The results of the Disabled Persons Citizens Jury

This consultation showed that levels of crime and traffic congestion were key priorities for improvement, as well as road safety, condition of roads and pavements, pollution and access to Health services. A Summary Leaflet, containing all of the priorities set out in the Community Strategy was also published.

The review document contained details of progress against the actions. The aim of both the original strategy and the reviewed strategy was to improve the quality of life for people living in, working in and visiting Leicestershire.  

With the changes to local government policy, outlined on the “New Sustainable Community Strategy” pages, the Leicestershire Together partnership were required to develop a new Sustainable Community Strategy. The new SCS (2008 – 2013) presents a new set of priorities for Leicestershire relating to people, themes and places. A 10 week public consultation period on the Sustainable Community Strategy was held between November 2007 and January 2008. Follow the links on the “New Sustainable Community Strategy” page to find out more about the structure of the new SCS, the priorities outlined in it and how this links to the Local Area Agreement (LAA2).