Plans to spending £2.5m on outsourcing landlord licensing is given green light
The green light has been given to a scheme to spend £2.5 million on a private contractor for licensing private rented homes.
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At a meeting of Wolverhampton Council's cabinet on Wednesday councillors voted to farm out services after being told it could not cope with managing licensing services in-house.
A new report for the committee said the council ‘faces challenges’ with staffing and IT while using a private provider would generate cost savings and greater compliance.
Councillor Steve Evans, cabinet member for housing, said: “We have got a lot of private rented sector landlords, it’s really important for the city and renters that they are safe in the knowledge that we have fit and proper landlords.
“We are talking potentially thousands of properties across the city.
“There are a number of ways of doing this, we don’t have the IT or the staff capacity to carry out thousands of checks, we have looked at other models.
“You could just set up your own team and hope they manage to get through thousands and it covers the costs, I don’t think that would be a viable way forward.”
The chosen provider will be awarded a five year contract worth £500,000 annually and the scheme would be funded by the fees collected which would be returned to the council.
The cabinet also welcomed a £3m grant from a central government fund to buy land and property for the next phase of the City East Gateway project.
Councillors were told the cash would be used to make improvements that would ease congestion around the junction of Neachells Lane and the A454 Willenhall Road.
Council leader Stephen Simkins said: “It is for the benefit of, not just residents of East Park and Bilston North, it’s for the whole of the city, it’s a gateway in and a gateway out.
“It connects us to Walsall and the wider Black Country, it has been problematic for years: that entrance into the eastern end of our city, and it is important that we are on top of that.”
Councillors approved a motion to delegate the final decisions on acquisition of sites to the cabinet member for transport and green city in consultation with the director of resident services.
