West Lothian Council delivers

Factfile 2009

West Lothian Council's annual report

This publication reflects the council's progress during 2008/09 and is based on the work set out in the Corporate Plan 2007/11. Each section has been written to give you an overview of our activities and an outline of what we expect to achieve during 2009/10.

Factfile 2009 - introduction

The past year has seen significant progress in many areas across the council. A major achievement was the completion by the Community Planning Partnership of West Lothian?s Single Outcome Agreement (SOA). The SOA is essentially an improvement plan, which identifies the 12 key areas that the partners want to address over the next three years.

Earlier this year we worked closely with Lothian and Borders Police and other Community Planning Partners on Operation Focus, which saw a drive to remove drug dealers from our streets and an environmental push to clean up the communities involved.

Work progressed well on our two new secondary schools. Armadale Academy and Deans Community High School, a combined investment of £60 million, will be opened later this year. Work is also nearing completion on the major refurbishments at Inveralmond Community High School, The James Young High School and St Kentigern?s Academy.

Livingston Leisure Pool (formerly Bubbles) had a major £4 million refurbishment following a fire. Work on a new £9.6 million swimming pool complex for Bathgate was started - to reduce energy costs and help the environment we installed wind turbines which will create enough energy for the pool and sports centre. Howden Park Centre reopened following a stunning £6 million redevelopment and the £4.6 million reconstruction project at the Burgh Halls, Linlithgow started.

Our traditional town centres have benefited from funding of £250,000 to enable them to take forward improvement plans. A further pot of £163,000 is available to enable towns to bid for funding on a project basis. A highlight of the year was to see work progressing on the first phase of 248 new council houses and the announcement of phase two - a further 452 new homes.

As we look to the future there is no doubt that the current recession will have serious consequences for the council. We expect budget restrictions in the near future to severely hamper our short-, medium- and long-term plans and drastically constrain spending. Our aim is to engage fully with communities to identify core needs. We will continue to work with our partners to investigate how we can work more efficiently and update you on our progress.

• Factfile 2009 - full version
• Factfile 2009 - summary version