Earlier this week, Bridgend Councils’s Town & Community Council Forum was given an outline of plans to review the county’s 20 town & community councils during this term (pdf).
While some changes were made to a select number of community councils before this year’s local elections, this review will be much broader.
The last full Community Governance Review took place in 2009, but there have been significant population and county council ward changes since then.
The report says the review will offer “an opportunity to put in place strong, clearly defined boundaries…and remove any anomalous boundaries.” Though, by law, such reviews “need to reflect local identities.”
Community council mergers aren’t ruled out, particularly if Bridgend (County Borough) Council wishes to delegate more responsibilities and functions down to town & community councils – meaning they need to be of a certain size.
The Community Governance Review is expected to take 12 months to complete and is anticipated to start in June 2023. The first elections to the new (if applicable) town & community councils would take place in May 2027.
