FRANK Letch has been voted in for a second term as chair of Mid Devon District Council, as he outlined what he called his party’s achievements during the past 12 months. 

Cllr Letch (Liberal Democrat, Crediton Lawrence) was nominated by leader Luke Taylor (Liberal Democrat, Bradninch) and secured the vote of councillors. 

“Frank has done a sterling job for the past 12 months and he’s an excellent choice to continue,” Cllr Taylor said. 

Cllr Letch said he had “thoroughly enjoyed” his time in the chair. 

“I have engaged with our district’s youth community, industries in the area and I’m going to do exactly the same in this forthcoming year,” Cllr Letch said. 

His deputy will be Cllr Gordon Czapiewski (Liberal Democrat, Tiverton Lowman). 

Cllr Taylor told fellow councillors he believes his party’s key achievements include shutting down the “failing vanity project” of 3 Rivers, a troubled housing developer the council owned. 

“The company has been closed, and the St George’s development in Tiverton is now being transformed into much-needed social housing,” he said. 

“This has increased the council’s social housing stock, with all 3 Rivers assets either sold or transferred back to council ownership.” 

In February, the council acknowledged that its cumulative loss from 3 Rivers was expected to hit £8.1 million. However, the authority needs to sell the firm’s properties to mitigate further losses. 

In March, a report by external auditors Grant Thornton said poor oversight of the firm had contributed to its failure and financial losses. 

It highlighted two areas of “significant weakness”, namely that the council did not adequately scrutinise the firm and that the delay in approving the company’s 2022 business plan that dented the authority’s reputation. 

Separately, Cllr Taylor said the annual budget for its leisure facilities had fallen by £400,000 thanks to the operations becoming more efficient, in part due to the installation of ground and air source heat pumps at its sites in Crediton and Tiverton. 

Cllr Taylor said the budget for the current financial year had been set without reserves being required, “all without much help from central government”, and he praised the authority’s staff for high collection rates for council tax (97.5 per cent), business rates (99.4 per cent) and debt recovery (98.9 per cent), meaning the district was among “some of the best in the country”. 

He added that the council was the first in Devon to grant care leavers a council tax exemption, and it would also be among those to start charging second-home owners a higher rate from next April. 

“If you are lucky enough to own a second home, we ask that you contribute to help those who need their first,” he said. 

Elsewhere, Cllr Taylor added that the council was in the top 10 per cent nationally for refuse collection, had purchased 11 properties using government funding to reduce its reliance on “more expensive B&Bs to house the growing number of homeless people” in Mid Devon, and that it had earned £2.4 million through investments. 

By Bradley Gerrard