Stevenage Development Board | biz4Biz - Stevenage 75th anniversary magazine | biz4Biz - Magazine - Page 21
Stevenage Development Board | biz4Biz
Stevenage Development Board
An independent voice delivering for the people of Stevenage
“Our vision is ambitious, our plan is
deliverable, and the message is simple:
investing £50m in the future of Stevenage is
an investment in the future of our country,
in the future of our children, and will
unleash over £600m of private investment
to supercharge UK businesses, as we once
again unify in a time of great national need,
and set a new blueprint for innovation at the
heart of a 21st Century New Town. You will
hear about skills, culture, and town centre
regeneration and how all will play their
part in unlocking Stevenage’s potential and
levelling-up opportunities for our residents.
Adrian Hawkins OBE
Chairman, Stevenage Development Board
I am a child of a New Town, literally. Born in
Stevenage in the 1950s in my parents’ council
house, I grew up, made friends and was
educated within my home town. It provided
the safe haven for me, my siblings and many
other families to develop and progress
throughout our lives, very similarly to how the
town was envisaged; Stevenage as a place
gave back directly to its people.
It is easy to underestimate the scale of
challenge facing Stevenage; as a town located
in ‘wealthy’ Hertfordshire, its pockets of deep
deprivation often glossed over in high-level
data; the focus on the opportunities ‘in’
Stevenage, not ‘for’ Stevenage. We face a
profound fork in the road – the opportunity to
Stevenage Development Board
level-up a community that is being left behind,
whilst simultaneously releasing the handbrake
on growth for the UK’s fastest-growing science
and technology sectors. That growth cannot
be allowed to dissipate from Stevenage; we
must harness the potential of our location and
amazing businesses to grow a critical mass
that drives the region’s economy, but to do so
in a way which brings our local people with us
rather than leaving them behind. Our £50m
Towns Fund proposal will achieve just that,
through a range of interventions including
delivery of a skills & technology centre,
provision for innovative commercial space,
investment in the town’s key facilities and
unlocking large-scale regeneration.”
Stevenage Development
Board members
In March 2020, The Stevenage Development
Board was established to oversee the
development of a Town Deal for Stevenage.
The Board’s role is to provide strategic
leadership and to set out a Town Investment
Plan with a clear vision, strategy and delivery
proposals in place, which reflect the ambitions
of, and deliver for, local people. The Board
consists of key stakeholders from public sector
organisations, private businesses, and not-forprofit organisations, to ensure a diverse range
of views are represented.