Report comment

Here is a link to the letter (via FOI) sent last May, from SCC planning dept to Chris Miele, the consultant used by the University to navigate them to planning permission.

http://www.jessophospital.org.uk/expert-opinion/letter-from-scc-planning-dept-to-sheffield-university/

A few weeks later, and following a meeting between the University Vice Chancellor and Sheffield Council Chief Executive (Heads of Planning and Development attended - they signed off the above letter..) , the tone of emails in FOI exchanges is quite different, with planning officers reluctantly progressing the application. The objections in that letter still stand, and clearly no concessions were made. It is striking that one of the most eloquent letters of objection came from the planning officers themselves.

As late as 28th November the Head of Urban Design and Conservation at the Council wrote to the planning officer (local press covered this): As you are all too aware my view (reflected by that of CAG, the Design Panel and fellow officers) is that the proposals for Jessop east have both serious conservation implications and constitute poor design and should therefore be refused in accordance with the NPPF. However, I fully understand that the economic benefits are considered to outweigh such concerns.
You have a difficult job but to ensure that we do not look foolish as an authority and do not make it impossible for us to refuse proposals on design grounds in future we have to be very clear about the balance that is being struck and the failings of the proposals.
I've done my best to think of some positives but have come up with very little. My central thought is that you could frame your report in terms of the views presented to you by the applicant ie using phrases such as 'it is claimed that', 'the approach is based on the concept that etc without commiting SCC to sharing in this belief/approach. .. etc.

Another officer pointed out the the City Development plan (draft, but adopted) contained a clause protecting the buildings because of 'economies of scale' that would be attractive to the University. That clause was silently removed and not mentioned in the planning reports (there were two - they messed up the first planning meeting, and the second one). The Universities argument was solely about public benefit which boiled down to economic benefits, yet the only council officer comment to be found via FOI or in the planning file is one severely criticising calculations offered by the University and commenting: "in particular there are several references to the fact that the University does not wish to sell the property and that if it did so it would include restrictive covenants in any sale document preventing anything other than educational use. That may well be factually correct but the point of the exercise would be to determine whether there is a viable alternative use which could be found for the property rather than demolition. To restrict uses in this way would make that even more difficult and so the appraisals in the report based on that assumption are not strictly relevant in this context."