Agenda item

            The Committee was advised that, following the city’s successful application to the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities (100RC) programme, officers had begun engaging with the Foundation to prepare for a stakeholder conference provisionally booked for 15th November, 2016 at the Waterfront Hall.  Following that event, work would begin on the recruitment of the Belfast ‘Commissioner for Resilience’ and planning for the Belfast resilience strategy that would be funded by the programme.

            The November conference would aim to bring together stakeholders to set out the broad resilience issues that would form the basis of a Belfast Resilience Strategy.  It would also help determine the likely role for a new Belfast ‘Commissioner for Resilience’.  The approach would seek to ensure the early engagement of elected Members in order to align the emerging resilience strategy with the priorities of the Belfast Agenda, particularly around the priorities for inclusive growth.  The conference logistics, strategy development facilitation and the position of the Commissioner for Resilience (for two years) would all be funded by 100RC.

            The Chief Executive explained that the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilience Cities programme provided grant and expert support to cities across the world to help them understand and prepare for future social, economic and environmental shocks and stresses.  One hundred cities were now part of the programme, including the final tranche of thirty cities that joined in May 2016.  (Belfast and Greater Manchester had now joined Glasgow, Bristol and London to form a regional group which 100RC would like to see working together to share learning and practice.)

            100RC was providing Belfast with the following:

     (i)          100% funding for strategic consultancy support (from Arup) for the initial ‘agenda setting’ process;

    (ii)          100% funding for logistical support for the conference (excluding venue hire);

  (iii)          100% grant funding to the Council to support the salary of a new ‘Commissioner for Resilience’ for an initial two years;

  (iv)          Strategic communications support from global communications consultants, Apco;

   (v)          Support from a number of ‘platform partners’ offering specific expertise to support delivery of the final resilience strategy; and

  (vi)          Ongoing access to the learning and practice of the other 100RC cities.

            The Belfast programme would begin with an ‘agenda setting’ conference which would be a facilitated all-day stakeholder event that would aim to identify the major shocks and stresses that a Belfast resilience strategy would need to address.  The conference would include a mix of workshop modules (tailored to suit the needs of Belfast).  They would include: Introduction to 100RC; What is resilience?; Prioritising Belfast’s shocks and stresses; Diagnostics; and identifying resilience building opportunities.  100RC was keen that the process included engagement with political representatives at the city and regional level.  It was therefore proposed that all Members would be invited to a scoping workshop at the City Hall the day before the conference in order to engage directly with 100RC officials and Arup on issues of specific importance to the Council.  100RC would also seek to invite political representatives from a comparable city to Belfast dealing with similar issues that had already developed a 100RC resilience strategy to share their experience with members.

            For the conference itself, it was proposed that Party Group leaders would be invited to attend.  It was also proposed that Party Group leaders would contribute to a short video that set out the Members’ vision for the city and their reflections on the main resilience issues.  That would be shown at the outset of the agenda setting workshop following a welcome from the Lord Mayor.  Finally, it was proposed that officers would engage with Members and 100RC to agree the most appropriate level of representation from the Northern Ireland Government Departments.

            Following the conference, officers would work with 100RC and Arup to prepare detailed recommendations for the twelve month development phase of the strategy which would be presented to the Committee for consideration.  100RC would also work with the Council to agree the role for the new Commissioner for Resilience who was expected to be recruited and in post by early 2017.  The Commissioner would oversee the development and implementation phases of the strategy.

            100Rc had set aside an initial conference budget of $40,000 to commission Arup and to provide logistical support, including travel, audio visual and catering for the event.  The Council was expected to cover venue hire which was estimated at £2,800 which had been identified in the existing Smart City budget.

            The Committee:

·        Noted 100RC’s ‘agenda setting’ approach and its financial contribution to the process;

·        Agreed to the proposed approach for engaging Members’ in shaping the strategy, including a specific members workshop at the City Hall and the attendance of Party Group leaders at the conference; and

·        Agreed to the proposed Council contribution to the venue hire.