Questions and answers about the Town Centre Regeneration Fund.
1. Why has the fund been introduced?
The Scottish Government recognises the importance of Scotland's town centres and local high streets to the economic and social fabric of the nation. The new £60m Town Centre Regeneration Fund is a sign of our commitment to the improvement of our town centres. We want to support practitioners to regenerate and grow these centres, particularly through challenging economic times.
2. What does the fund aim to achieve?
We want to support regeneration and growth in town centres the length and breadth of Scotland, and to give everyone the opportunity to get behind their local town centre. We will be looking for projects that can provide tangible economic, social and environmental benefit to their local communities. We will be encouraging bids to be coordinated through local partnerships, including business and community groups, to encourage a legacy of improved local partnerships.
3. Who can apply for funding?
We will accept bids from Local Authorities, Community Planning Partnerships, Town Centre Management organisations, Business Improvement Districts, local Chambers of Commerce, Urban Regeneration Companies, Registered Social Landlords, businesses and third sector groups. All applicants will be required to prove their legal identity and their nexus in the town centre on behalf of which they are submitting the bid. Only one bid will be accepted per organisation per town centre, and we will be happy to consider thematic bids for multiple town centres. We will be looking favourably upon those bids which are coordinated through local partnership arrangements including, for example, the Community Planning Partnership or Business Improvement District.
4. What is meant by 'legal personality/ identity'? How do I know if my organisation has one?
For a body to have a legal personality, it must be legally constituted to act as a single individual rather than simply as a group of individual members. In practical terms, this means that the body must have taken steps to constitute itself legally, for example by registering with Companies House or through a formal partnership agreement. Statutory bodies such as local authorities and Community Planning Partnerships have legal personality.
5. What happens if my organisation has no legal identity? Can we still apply for funding?
The existence of a legal identity is an essential criteria for funding, and we will not consider applications from bodies that cannot show evidence that they qualify. However, it should be borne in mind that we are encouraging and will be scoring favourably applications that reflect the views and plans of a range of local partners. Organisations that are ineligible to apply in their own right can still have a role in influencing an application for their town centre which is then submitted by an eligible body. They can also have a role in delivering the project should the application be successful.
6. What is a 'town centre'? Does it include high streets?
Local authority development plans include classifications of all centres within their boundaries. To ensure that a broad spectrum of town centres and local high streets are eligible, we are accepting applications from those centres that meet the definition in Scottish Planning Policy 8 - Town Centres and Retailing. This extends eligibility to areas identified in local plans as either a town centre, or a centre which is described in the text of local plans as performing the functions of a town centre (having a main retail function and core). This will include local high streets within city centres, but not the cities themselves.
7. What about projects that take place outside the boundary of the town centre identified in the local authority development plan?
To be eligible, all projects must take place within a recognised town centre or local high street. The area in which investment will be targeted must therefore sit within the boundary identified in the local authority development plan.
8. What types of project might be able to apply?
The Town Centre Regeneration Fund can only support capital investment. This might include, for example, infrastructure improvements such as improving pedestrian access, remediation of vacant and derelict sites, fitting of vacant sites to provide car parking facilities, or structural remodelling of business premises.
9. What is the deadline for applications?
There will be two rounds of assessment of applications. The deadline for consideration in the first round was June 5 2009. The deadline for the second tranche of applications was August 28 2009.
10. When do you expect to announce successful bids?
We will want to assess applications and make offers of grant as quickly as possible, and would aim to have completed first round assessments around late July and second round assessments around mid to late October 2009.
11. Does the Government intend for the full £60m to be spent in 2009-10?
Funding has been accelerated from 2010-11 in recognition of the additional needs of our town centres in these difficult economic times. The funding does therefore require to be spent in financial year 2009-10, and we will be prioritising those bids which are able to quickly deliver and claim their funding in 2009/10.
12. Does the funding need to spent by the applicant in financial year 2009-10?
In the majority of cases, grant requires to be claimed following completion of capital works. Where work will not be completed in this financial year, the case for payment of funds in advance of need will be considered on a case by case basis. Applications in advance of need will require careful scrutiny and only be awarded in exceptional circumstances.
13. Will there be a Towns Fund in 2010-11?
We have made £60m available in 2009-10. We have no current plans for provision in 2010-11.
14. Will there be any limits on the level of spending available to each area/project?
We want to create opportunities for real and lasting improvements to our high streets, and at the same time ensure that the benefit of the fund is felt across the whole of Scotland. While there will be no absolute limits on the levels of funding available to each project, we will need to make sure that no one project or area benefits at the expense of other town centres in Scotland. In practice, this probably means that bids for in excess of £3,000,000 will require additional scrutiny.
15. Will planning applications linked to successful bids to the Town Centre Regeneration Fund be accelerated/prioritised?
The consideration of planning applications is a matter for planning authorities in the first instance. Wider measures being implemented through the modernisation of the planning system aim to increase the efficiency of processes and change the culture of how the procedures are implemented. More information is available at: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/built-environment/planning
16. The town centre I am applying for is eligible, however there is no boundary drawn around it in the plan - how do we know the area we are applying for is falls within the eligible town centre area?
If you are a local authority, you should send an Ordnance Survey (OS) map and an explanation of the area to towncentres@scotland.gsi.gov.uk. We will then take a view as to the area that could reasonably be considered to constitute the town centre. If you are not a local authority, you should contact your local authority in the first instance to ask them to share an OS map with you, which will allow you to determine whether you are in the centre of the relevant town.
17. Will state aid considerations limit the assistance available to individual projects and/or applicants?
The Scottish Government, and any other body administering public funding, is required to consider the European Commission's state aid rules. Where state aid is determined to be present (see http://www.stateaidscotland.gov.uk), funding will have to be provided within set parameters. Funding, of not more than €200,000 to a single enterprise, over a three-year fiscal period, is deemed too small to be a distorting state aid and as such is not caught by the rules. It is worth noting that there are specific criteria to meet to have funding classified as de minimis. Where funding, which is deemed to be state aid, is over this amount the body administering the funds will have to seek to do so under an approved European Commission measure, such as an exemption or notification.
18. Do I need to submit competitive quotes with my application?
We do not expect applicants to provide their competitive quotes to the Scottish Government at the time they submit their applications. It is, however, the responsibility of the applicant to ensure that goods and services are acquired by competition unless there are convincing reasons to the contrary, and that their procurement is based on value for money, in the case of applicable bodies in accordance with the Scottish Public Finance Manual. Documentary evidence of any activity of a competitive nature in relation to an application for funding from the Town Centre Regeneration Fund will require to be held and retained, if successful in line with the terms and conditions of the Fund that will be issued, and may also be asked for during the course of the assessment process for the Fund or after Funds have been awarded.
19. Can funds which have already been invested in an area be counted as leverage? For example, I want to apply for funding for phase three of a four stage project, can I count phases 1 and 2 as leverage?
We will only take account of the funding being leveraged-in in the phase of the project to which Town Centre Regeneration Fund would be contributing. Funding for previous phases will not be taken in to account.
20. Do all applications need to be endorsed by someone?
We are looking for the support of a body or bodies other than the main applicant, and we ask for evidence that the bid has been developed in partnership and indications of support for the application will be taken into account in the scoring of bids. The 'applicant endorsement' section of the application form is a separate requirement and refers to the section of the application that requests details of an independent referee in order in the main to verify the legitimacy of the organisation applying.
21. If local authorities are approached and asked to endorse applications, are they expected to decide what applications they would wish to endorse?
It would be for the local authority to decide whether they wished to indicate support for an application, and for the applicant to evidence that the bid has been developed and agreed with local partners. The application also asks for details of an independent referee. If a local authority was approached and asked to act as an independent referee for an applicant, there would be no reason not to do so unless the local authority in question had doubts about the legitimacy of the organisation.
22. Can external consultancy costs be capitalised and form part of the application?
Costs may only be capitalised where they contribute directly to the acquisition or construction of the asset. Applications including such costs should provide information which supports the expenditure being capitalised.
23. Can the cost of internal recharges for specialist teams be capitalised and form part of the application?
Only those costs that relate to time directly spent by employees, for example internal Quantity Surveyors or Architects, on the acquisition or construction of the specific asset should be capitalised. Administrative, including administrative staff costs or project managers, and other general overheads may not be capitalised. Applications including such costs should provide information which supports the expenditure being capitalised.
24. Can work that is required to the inside of a building, for example to make is Disability Discrimination Act compliant, be considered capital?
Whether these costs can be capitalised will depend on the extent to which the work is being carried out for the purposes of or in conjunction with the functions of a local authority or, in the case of another body, for the public benefit and whether the expenditure will increase the value of the asset or substantially lengthen its useful life. Applications including such costs should provide information which supports the expenditure being capitalised.
25. I plan to submit appendices to my application to provide more detail on how it meets the requirements of the fund. Will these be taken into consideration?
It is our intention to take into account only the information contained in the application form. This will ensure a process which is fair, since all applicants will have the same opportunity to tell us about their project. It will also assist us in completing assessment of applications in the challenging timescales envisaged and proceed to award grant to successful applicants. We would strongly advise candidates to limit any supplementary pages to those request to verify their application i.e. proof of legal constitution, letter of support from named local partners, relevant extracts from local strategic plans that demonstrate the vision for the town centre that the project will help to deliver etc.
26. If I want to acquire a private land or property interest with Town Centre Regeneration funding, can I pay more than the market value?
Public sector bodies do not pay more than the District Valuer's opinion of market value. A private purchaser is not constrained by a valuer's opinion of market value and can pay over market value and go some way to meet the owner's expectations in a way that public bodies cannot. As the Town Centre Regeneration Fund is administered by the Scottish Government however, funding - whether to a public sector body or a private purchaser - cannot therefore be used to purchase land or property at a cost exceeding the market value.