Calderdale Catchment Plan Director at the Environment Agency has sent out the Workshop Invitation for 18th June, 9:30 – 13:00, Imperial Crown Hotel, Halifax, HX1 1QE.

I’d like to invite you to participate in an important half day workshop to formally start the process of creating the Calderdale Catchment Plan. We’re keen to bring together the key individuals, groups and organisations who are working on flooding and water management issues, to share the work they are doing, pool resources and collectively design a process that will enable us to produce an effective Catchment Plan.

The intention is to find productive ways of working across sectors and to build good working relationships. In this way we can then address the issues, explore the areas of agreement and contention and focus on finding ways forward acceptable to all.

By the end of the session we will have:

· Shared the work everyone is doing and identified areas of agreement and
contention.

· Set out the scope and purpose of the Catchment Plan and what we expect it to
achieve.

· Considered how the plan needs to be structured and how we can best work
together over the next 2 – 3 months as the plan is developed.

The Environment Agency and Calderdale Council will be able to provide a lot of support over the planning period but we want the wide range of individuals, groups and organisations who will benefit from the Catchment Plan’s actions and recommendations to be central to this planning process. This includes working with the wider public.

Timescales are tight for this project with a deadline for the production of the plan set by government for the end of October 2016. We have to meet this deadline but want to ensure that there are robust plans in place to keep everyone involved as the plan is implemented and updated over the coming months and years.

The intention is to undertake most of the participative planning between now and the end of August, bring everyone together to review the draft plan in September before its publication in October. This initial workshop has been set for 18th June as the best time to avoid other events and festivals taking place. Leaving it until July would shorten the time we have to work on the Catchment Plan.

If you can’t make the workshop we are happy for you to nominate someone to come in your place. The following week we will be able to provide workshop notes and arrange a briefing / feedback session for anyone who couldn’t make June 18th. The workshop is about planning and a good process to make sure the Catchment Plan itself can take on board everyone’s views and issues. The actual work to produce the Catchment Plan will take place over the next couple of months and will provide a range of opportunities for
everyone who has an interest to participate.

Please confirm if you can make the workshop by Friday 10th June so we can invite others if you can’t make it. We will send more details within a few days.

ENDS

There is info on Calderdale Catchment Plan here. 

It says: To register interest in Calderdale Catchment Plan, email enquiries@environment-agency.gov.uk