For the third time, Huntingdonshire District Council has won an exemplar award for the excellence of its service delivery using the Local Land and Property Gazetteer.
The title ‘Best Performing Authority’ was awarded to the council at a presentation ceremony hosted by the National Land and Property Gazetteer and National Street Gazetteer. The ‘Best Performing Authority’ is awarded to the council, which has the highest points score based upon a number of different parameters. The award is a reflection of the efforts made by the council in maintaining and improving its gazetteer, Huntingdonshire scored maximum points.
The council also received a commendation in the ‘Most Creative Use’ category for a project with Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Fire and Rescue Service, which because property information held by both organisations is shared and improved. This helps the Fire and Rescue Service to locate properties in the district more quickly and effectively when answering emergency calls.
Councillor Mike Simpson, executive councillor for information technology, said: “I am delighted that the hard work and diligence of the Local Land and Property Gazetteer team in maintaining property data to nationally agreed standards has been recognised once again. It is particularly pleasing to have a commendation for the project with the Fire Service as it demonstrates how sharing data helps to provide effective and efficient services for all our customers.”
Gill Usher, on behalf of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Fire and Rescue, said: ”We anticipate that this award will encourage other emergency services to seek out opportunities to work together with local authorities to deliver a dataset which will underpin our service in support of public safety.”
Dan Horrex, Information Manager said “The hard work of the team has enabled a maximum score in the Best Performing Authority category. The LLPG is continually linked to new Council datasets, which achieves efficiency savings and ensures the highest quality of data is held by the Council.”
David Lloyd, LLPG Manager said “This award is once again down to the hard work and diligence of the LLPG team to maintain the property data to nationally agreed standards.”
The Local Land and Property Gazetteer has become the key source of property information for many of the council’s services. It is dynamically linked to several other council IT systems and is used by a number of departments. It helps to reduce duplication and inefficiency by creating property addresses only once, but in a way that can be maintained and used many times enabling the sharing and linking of information across the council. One of its applications is helping with council tax collection --- helping to ensuring that all properties and businesses within the district are billed.