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Appendix 1 - Property Management Strategy and Register - April 2008

Secretarial/WP/Corporate/HFRA FGP HFRA 19 06 08 AMWG 24 4 08 DH/JMW/10/6/08

HFRA Finance and General Purposes Committee 19 6 2008 Appendix 1

Asset Management Working Group: report of meeting held 24 April 2008

Hampshire Fire and Rescue Authority

Property Management Strategy and Register

April 2008

Updated 27/05/2008

Introduction

This property management strategy and register both informs and is influenced by the Authority's corporate aims and objectives set out in our corporate "Fire and Rescue Plan" (which is updated annually and published in March each year). It is a `living document' which is updated frequently. It gathers together and summarises data and information from various sources that are essential for the future planning and cost-effective management of the Authority's built-estate.

The strategy section sets out the main guiding principles and processes used to ensure that our built estate is kept under continual review. The register provides a summary of each of the Authority's built-estate assets with: key reference data; information from condition surveys; energy consumption; and, most importantly, a very brief assessment of current and anticipated future operational needs.

In October/November each year, information drawn from the strategy and register is considered in the preparation of the Authority's capital programme and revenue budget.

Programmes and plans of building works are then prioritised and scheduled by our Property Services Department on the basis of urgency and the resources available. These are continually updated to take account of urgent and unforeseen repair and maintenance needs together with any changes to operational priorities.

Strategy

Strategic aim

The Authority's strategy for its built-estate is driven by the clear and simple aim to: `provide and maintain properties that are fit for purpose'.

This is also the mission statement that drives the Property Services Department's medium-term business plan.

Achieving this aim relies on:

_ understanding both the current and future operational needs of the Service;

_ having up-to-date information on the current and future building maintenance needs of all property assets;

_ identifying the resource implications of meeting these needs;

_ prioritising - through a continuous risk management process - programmes and plans of building works for the short-, medium- and longer-term;

_ continually reviewing how our assets can be used more effectively.

The operational perspective

Our buildings are there to meet operational needs. However, those needs continue to change as we:

_ respond to new and emerging risks in communities

_ introduce new or different methods and practices of delivering services to the public.

These considerations (often the basis for, or outcomes of, reviews of emergency cover or working practices) may challenge or call into question the:

_ essential operational justification for the site or building

_ suitability of its location

_ provision of particular accommodation and facilities.

In other words, we need to regularly assess whether the property is genuinely fit for purpose now and for the foreseeable future. This assessment is initially undertaken by the Service Management Team annually in June and is deliberately timed to identify any relevant issues or opportunities that might need to be taken into account when updating the corporate plan.

Information and comments from the operational perspective are summarised on the individual property register pages.

The property maintenance perspective

The requirement for buildings at a particular location may well be justified for the foreseeable future from an operational perspective, but there is a corresponding need to continually review the condition of buildings (and facilities provided) to ensure that they:

_ satisfy the operational needs in the most cost-effective way

_ provide accessible, healthy and safe accommodation for our staff and visitors

_ are built, adapted and managed in ways that help to reduce or minimise the impact on the environment (our carbon footprint)

_ are improved, repaired and maintained effectively and efficiently

_ utilised to best advantage - including the potential to share surplus accommodation with partner organisations and to generate income.

Taking a `property perspective' can often reveal alternative or better solutions for meeting current or changing operational needs.

The essential source of information is provided from our, independently-assessed rolling-programme of condition surveys.¹ Approximately one-third of the built-estate is reviewed each year: i.e. each property is surveyed and comprehensively reported on every three years. This information is supplemented by information received via day-to-day building and plant defect reports, and other requests for improvements from building users.

Further information and advice is provided by our estates adviser.² This includes outcomes and recommendations from specifically commissioned investigations/surveys; and/or issues and opportunities identified in the course of regular asset valuation work (including reviews of business rates). We have agreed with our external auditors that our built-estate assets will be valued under a three-year rolling-programme: i.e. so that each property is formally visited, assessed and valued at least once every three years with those values updated annually by the application of an accepted price index.

Major, sensitive or complex built-estate projects are taken to the Authority's informal joint member/officer Asset Management Working Group (AMWG) for consideration. Recommendations from the Group are presented to meetings of the Finance and General Purposes Committee, and/or to the full Authority for approval.

Based on these sources of information, recommended repairs, maintenance and improvements are considered, cost estimates provided, and then prioritised (risk assessed) taking into account needs identified from the operational perspective. These are summarised on the individual property register pages.

The age profile of our fire station buildings obviously has a significant bearing on the scale of repair and maintenance issues as well as general `fitness for purpose' of our built estate. The age of our built estate can be summarised as follows:

The resource perspective

Information from the property register is used to inform the Authority's capital programme and revenue budget preparation process. It is a fact that there is always scope to spend more than the resources we are likely to have available on the repair, maintenance and improvement of our buildings. Dealing with the maintenance backlog, or property `time bomb' as the Audit Commission has described it, is likely to remain a major concern. As building stock ages maintenance costs will inevitably increase and it has been estimated that by 2008 building maintenance costs for local authority properties would typically need to increase by over 40% (over and above inflation) from a base year of 1995.³

Information from the condition surveys alone would suggest that regular annual revenue budget allocations would need to be increased by over 60% per annum to deal with only the `poor', `very poor' and `urgent' repair and maintenance needs over the next three years. This does not include the need to provide a contingency for emergent and unforeseen urgent building problems; nor does it make any allowance for the effects of inflation since the survey was last completed.

Inevitably, therefore, work programme plans have to remain flexible because priorities will be continually subject to change and compromise in order to keep within budget allocations.

The information summarised in the "short-term (1-3 years) repair, maintenance and improvement needs" table on the individual property register sheets is collated to produce an estimated budget requirement for the forthcoming three years. It would be reasonable to assume that this represents dealing with no more than about 75% of the what are considered to be the highest priority works identified in the condition surveys.

For the three-years 2008/09 to 2010/11 this is estimated as follows:

Longer-term needs are also identified and the collated information can be summarised as follows:

Taking this longer-term perspective enables the Authority to anticipate and plan for any major capital and revenue needs, including the impact on future levels of general reserves and borrowing needs. By 2012/13, it is suggested that the Authority should consider increasing its budgets for repair and maintenance by about £0.5m to provide a realistic sum to meet these longer-term needs and to keep pace with the problem of further deterioration.

The property register also summaries energy consumption for each property for the preceding three financial years. We are keen to reduce our carbon footprint and a potentially significant positive contribution can be made towards this aim by reducing our energy consumption.⁴ The usage data is provided to building users and managers so that they can consider (as part of their local plans) what actions might reasonably be taken to reduce consumption. Monitoring and comparing this data might also identify buildings where investment in new heating and lighting systems/equipment and other energy-saving actions could be justified.

Other utility running costs associated with the build estate can be summarised as follows:

Summary of the Authority's built-estate assets

The Authority currently has 52 fire stations of which 49 are in freehold ownership.

The Headquarters site at Leigh Road, Eastleigh and the (now vacant) vehicle workshops site at Winnall, Winchester are also freehold ownership.

A site at Carpenters Down, Basingstoke - originally acquired (in 1976) for the development of a second fire station in Basingstoke - was declared surplus to requirements in 2007. It was put on the open market and ten offers have been received. A formal decision on whether to accept the preferred and recommended offer will be made by the Authority in June 2008.

As a consequence of upgrading of `day-crewed duty system' fire stations to `continuous shift-crewed' fire stations, there is no longer a requirement to provide housing for firefighters. As a consequence, the Authority has previously agreed to dispose of its housing stock. As at April 2008, the Authority still owns 17 houses [9 at Winchester, 7 at Havant and 1 at Andover]. It is anticipated that the houses at Winchester will be sold by December 2008, and those at Havant by April 2009.

List of properties

Secretarial/DCS/AMWG property management strategy and register 27 May 2008

Secretarial/WP/Corporate/HFRA FGP HFRA 19 06 08 AMWG 24 4 08 DH/JMW/10/6/08