Reconfiguring Arts services in Birmingham

Saving / income opportunity  title: To reconfigure the Constituency Community Arts provision. 

Brief description of saving / income opportunity: To absorb the majority of the duties and responsibilities of the Community Arts Worker into the wider Community Development Team and to supplement that arrangement with a limited amount of sessional staffing to cover peaks in workload, thereby enabling the deletion of the post.

Evaluation of viability of the saving / income opportunity:  The Arts Officer post of 18.5 hours per week at SO1 is classed as desirable rather than essential.  The post holder left the service in February 2007 and the vacancy is being covered at the present time by one of the community development trainees in the Constituency. With the Community Development team now fully established with two FTE trainees built into the structure, the Team is confident that it can absorb the additional work, albeit, supplemented with a small budget to support the employment of sessional staff as and when needed on specific projects.

The Community Arts Worker post currently reports to one of the Senior Community Development Workers.  It is entirely feasible for the full range of duties and responsibilities to pass to that officer (Linda Kelly) who will oversee all the activities contained in the JD, supported on a day to day basis by one of the trainees.

Whenever possible, staff from central teams will be utilised to support Arts Projects and, additionally, a special appeal will be made for constituency colleagues to attend SWAT meetings and take on the odd task. 

Where professional expertise is required on specific projects, resources will be needed to buy them in. This makes more efficient use of resources to buy in expertise only when specifically needed, rather than having it on tap 52 weeks a year via the CAW.  A budget will, however, need to be established for the purchase of sessional staff.  An initial estimate is that 360 hours of sessional time should be adequate per financial year, but we would wish to review that estimate after the first full year of operation in case it needs adjusting upwards or downwards in the light of experience. 

Recommendation to SMT: Delete the Community Arts Worker post (currently vacant), and use roughly 25% of the salary budget to purchase sessional workers on specific projects. 

Saving / Income potential in £’s: Saving current post = (P/T 0.5 FTE) SO1 @ scp 29 = £11,587 plus oncosts of £2,433 amounting to £14,020. 

Expenditure on 360 hours of sessional staffing at S01 i.e. £12.21 per hour = £4,395.60 plus oncosts of £923 amounting to £5,318.67

Overall saving is £8,701.33   

Resources required to implement recommendation (if any): 360 hours of sessional staffing per annum at approx £5,318

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