Boston: New possibilities and a town for everyone
St Botolphs bridge, Boston 2019 © Courtesy of Boston Borough Council
There is a palpable sense of optimism and possibility among the team responsible for delivering the Town Deal for Boston.
“Get out there, speak to people and start connecting people; but stop thinking like a traditional local authority,” says Michelle Sacks in advice to other Towns who want to galvanise the opportunities presented by the Towns Fund programme.
This is exactly what Michelle and her team at Boston Borough Council and East Lindsey District Council are doing. Identifying influential Board members was a strategic process that has ignited dynamic new relationships across the borough. These connections have already enabled Boston to attract significant inward investment from food manufacturers Plant & Bean Ltd who are now in the process of relocating to the Town and make Boston home to Europe’s largest meat-free factory. Key players in the education sector have also benefited from understanding and aligning their aims, and discussions among Board members have opened up the possibility of expanding the local port.
Building trust with those left behind
Between 2001 and 2017 Boston’s population grew 22 per cent due to inward migration particularly from Eastern European countries. However, there is an outward migration of young people and Boston is in the bottom 30 per cent of neighbourhoods in England when it comes to employment outcomes.[1] Prior to Covid-19, of those 16-24 year-olds who stay, 7 per cent claimed out of work benefits, compared to a national figure of less than 2 per cent[2].
Many of Boston’s businesses had been operating quite separately and Clive Gibbon, Economic Development Manager at Boston Council, has been focused on strengthening relationships and “nurturing business confidence, for businesses to actually trust, us, fully understand the support we can give and create an environment where businesses can flourish”, he says.
Michelle acknowledges the challenges faced by the town. “We've been selected because of the levelling up agenda,” she says.
“We were keen to ensure that our Towns Fund bid started to address Boston’s challenges in a clear, coherent and joined up way through consultation with our residents and businesses.”
New connections sparking new ideas
In Boston, the Towns Fund programme has been harnessed as a springboard to build confidence, establish authentic networks and raise the profile of Boston nationally and internationally. While generating proposals for their Town Investment Plan (TIP), the newly connected members of the Town Deal Board started to explore the potential of expanding the town’s port. Michelle hopes the proposed extension will place Boston at the centre of Lincolnshire plc - and UK plc - in post-Brexit Britain in years to come, an advantage that just wasn’t on the table before the Town Deal Board began to share ideas.
“I can categorically say, had we not had the Town Deal platform that brought those people together, we would not be sitting here today, being able to talk about the Port of Boston Gateway to Growth as our project, which started off as a concept from those people around the Town's board table,” says Michelle.
Joining up the education sector for learners of all ages
Strengthening relationships across all levels of the education sector in Boston has been another early success resulting from connections nurtured within the Town Deal Board. “In the past there was competition within the education system”, says Clive, with institutions vying to attract sixth formers. By collaborating on the Town Deal Board, the sector is now working towards shared aims, with a better understanding of what each educational institution offers. As a result, the University of Lincoln has set up an office within Boston College for the first time. The ‘productivity hub’ for business and education will enable them to work together to signpost learners to the best provision for them at a time when acquiring new skills has become crucial for all age groups.
A seamless introduction to Boston securing the relocation of Plant & Bean Ltd
Plant & Bean's new site in Boston will eventually employ 500 people and the growing skills offer was an important part of attracting the company to the Town. When Plant and Bean visited Boston over the summer of 2020 Clive and Michelle were able to confidently demonstrate the breadth of the Town’s offer by drawing on the Town Deal Board network. They introduced the Principal from Boston College to discuss skills and enterprise, and the Dean of Holbeach Campus, part of the University of Lincoln and a leading institution in food, technology and design (robotics and food tech). They are also connecting Plant & Bean Ltd to local growers which are an important part of the companies’ supply chain and were able to talk to the Director of Port of Boston about the opportunities to import and export from Boston, another central part of their operation.
“Those parties are on our Town Deal Board, and because they have all been involved in the project development that went into the TIP, they share that collective ambition for the place, for the people, and to attract those inward investments,” says Michelle.
“We could bring those partners who were then able to talk authoritatively about their service areas, their industry, and what they could do to support that growth and expansion, and that was important to Plant & Bean in terms of where they located.”
A two-way conversation and a town for everybody
“It's not just about a planning process. It's about the skills agenda, it's about creating the link with our young people and it's about inclusive growth. Growth and prosperity are for all of our residents, and all of our partners, not just a select few,” says Michelle.
Michelle and her team are committed to bringing the people of Boston along for the journey, engaging consistently, and shaping the TIP based on the feedback coming in. A cornerstone of their commitment to transparency and dialogue is the Boston Town Deal website. This provides a central hub for progress updates, key documents, blogs and videos, and has proved popular – a video on Boston’s connection to the Mayflower ship and its historic voyage has received 100k views and over 260 comments to date. The team has also mobilised social media as an engagement tool, communicating with people through the channels they use regularly and inviting them to join conversation.
“We're being open and transparent, which is really important. This comes with governance, but sometimes governance is dry, and actually what you want is your community to be engaged,” Michelle says.
Yet Michelle recognises that “if there's already a sense within your community of being forgotten left behind it's hard to generate engagement. So, for us it's really important that we maintain that dialogue. It’s a real bottom up approach and a two-way conversation. We want to hear and have the feedback.”
Having secured a successful Town Deal of up to £21.9 million in March 2021, the Boston Town Deal Board is continuing conversations with communities of residents, businesses, educators and potential investors, whilst they stride towards a confident and connected future for the Town.
This story was written from a conversation with Michelle Sacks, Joint Deputy Chief Executive (Place), Boston Borough Council and East Lindsey District Council and Clive Gibbon, Economic Development Manager at Boston Borough Council.
Boston is one of 101 places invited by the Government to develop Town Deal proposals to deliver long-term economic recovery, clean growth, jobs and prosperity as part of the £3.6 billion Towns Fund. Boston submitted a successful Town Investment Plan and secured a Town Deal of up to £21.9 million in March 2021. Boston is currently developing business cases to take forward their Town Deal proposals.