City and a Rainbow city, Cork has already demonstrated its leadership in reaching for the highest international standards in what it does for the people of Cork. Thus, the Plan is part of a whole range of International, National, Regional and Local plans that work together to guide local planning and development. Some policies are set by central government and are high level while others, like the Plan, are applied at a local authority level and focus on specific types of development, in this case, community and economic. Due to this Cork City Council commissioned a review of all relevant policies to the Plan . ‘ A Policy Review for the Development of High-Level Goals for the new Local Economic and Community Plan (LECP) for Cork City ’ was conducted by Cork University Business School in 2022 (see Appendix 2 of the Plan). The review identified 75 active community, social, economic and environmental policies and strategies. This helped Cork City Council in developing the LECP High-Level Goals, objectives and actions with the intention of not duplicating what was already being done in other plans, etc., but instead providing additionality and synergy. The preparation and drafting of the Plan have been assisted by an Advisory Steering Group at all stages of development. A collaborative approach was taken and this is reflected in the joint oversight of the Cork City Local Community Development Committee (LCDC), the Community, Culture and Placemaking Strategic Policy Committee (SPC) and Economic Development, Enterprise and Planning Strategic Policy Committee (SPC) of the Council. A local-led and coordinated approach are also key characteristics of this Plan with collaborative partnerships developed with organisations representatives across the public, voluntary and community sector and business and sectoral interests. Cork City Council produced a ‘Report of Consultation on the Draft Cork City Local Economic and Community Plan 2024 - 2029’ which was submitted to the Members of Cork City Local Community Development Committee (LCDC) and Strategic Policy Committees (SPCs) for their consideration and approval. Review of the outgoing LECP The outgoing LECP 2016-2021 entitled ‘Pure Cork- An Action Plan for the City’ was the first plan of its kind and so it was important that a comprehensive review was undertaken to help identify the learnings to be brought forward to improve upon the development and implementation of the new plan. A traffic light review showed how 87% (206 actions) of all actions were completed, 10% (24 actions) commenced by behind schedule and only 3% (7 actions) were not started. This demonstrated a very high success rate, however, it also highlighted that the majority of these actions were completed after the first two years of the plan. Therefore, the new Plan needed to consider a way of evaluating actions regularly to enable new actions to be added over the lifetime of the Plan.
Analysis
As part of the Plan process Cork City Council carried out an economic and community: strengths, Constraints, opportunities and threats (SCOT) analysis. The Plan presents a summary statement which draws on the socio-economic analysis, the policy review and especially the findings from the local public consultation process. It is an important part of the evidence base development of the High-Level Goals in Stage 3: Develop the Objectives and Actions outlined in the Plan.
Public Consultation
A comprehensive public consultation process was carried out across Cork City plan area, engaging groups not traditionally well-represented in such consultations. This comprehensive public consultation was an important element of the preparation of the Plan Framework. In the roll-out of the public consultation process, a wide representation of local communities, interests and groups in society (young people, migrants, people with disabilities) was achieved through a mix of online consultation and workshops. The Cork City Council report outlines and summarises the findings of a public consultation that took place over 10 weeks in March, April and May 2023 for the development of the new Local Economic and Community Plan 2024 – 2029. Input was sought from all who call Cork City home, who work, do business
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