Wednesday, 20 December 2006

Another icy morning. But once again, bright sunshine broke through just as I entered Watford.

Local Area Agreements

The Hertfordshire LAA (Local Area Agreement) includes a target that 17% of adults across the county will be regularly volunteering by 2009. This is based on a county-wide MORI survey conducted in 2006 that shows 14% of adults currently volunteer. Watford has a difficult position because its MORI “baseline” is only 6%. The difficulty is that the survey was designed only to give statistical assurance across the county as a whole and not for individual areas of the county. In fact, in Watford just 100 people were interviewed, so no real confidence at all can be placed in the local baseline. A different group of 100 people might have produced a baseline of 20%, or 10%, or 4%.

When the exercise is repeated in 2009, 100 Watfordians will be asked “Do you regularly volunteer for at least two hours a week?” (I paraphrase slightly). We want as many Watfordians as possible (at least 17 out of 100) to respond “Yes”. But the actual response will of course depend wholly on which 100 people are randomly selected for interview.

Of course, people are looking to WCVS and the Watford Volunteer Centre to play a leading role promoting volunteering. And of course we will. But it’s not an easy position: the quality of baseline data is poor, there is no well-defined target to reach in Watford, no established method of getting from A to B, and no confidence in the system that will eventually be used to measure our actual achievement.

Our Volunteer Centre is supported by just one half-time worker: in three years can she really deliver a near three-fold increase in local volunteering? Helen is intelligent, experienced, hard working and her chutneys are held in high esteem - but she does not have supernatural powers.

It is important to demonstrate that WCVS (and Watford generally) can make a solid contribution to the LAA process. It is also important to be realistic. This raises all sorts of questions about two-tier local government and Local Area Agreements. Don’t get me started.

So this morning I called Hertfordshire County Council and spoke with Ben. He displayed a good understanding of the issues and put me in touch with a colleague of his who co-ordinates the County Council’s communications around the LAA.

We will talk in the new year, but some very useful markers have been laid down.
More property concerns

Back in the office, I talked again with the Woodside Community Centre about their lease with Watford Borough Council, and then spent some time working on the directory we are producing of Watford’s community groups alongside an exercise to assess the contribution these groups make to the local community and the economy.

I left the office about 6:00 PM and headed off into the icy fog that had once more descended.