Central Beds Council are asking schools, parents and other interested parties to help decide how school places are provided ahead of an anticipated population boom.
Current estimates show that around 2,000 new homes will be built each year, for the next five years – including 7,000 in Houghton Regis – resulting in about 6,000 extra pupils.
The council has a duty to ensure there are sufficient places to meet this extra demand and if adopted, the new principles will help shape how this is done.
In March of next year, councillors will approve a new programme of investment in new school places to meet the needs of this growing local population.
Further consultation will be undertaken on specific proposals, whether the new places are provided by creating a new school, by expanding an exsisting school or academy.
The nine principles, which will inform the decisions made in March, cover things like providing local schools for local children, supporting the expansion of successful and popular schools and ensuring schools are the right size to be financially and educationally stable.
Councillor Mark Versallion said: “This is an important piece of work for us. We estimate that we are going to need to spend more than £90million in providing news school places over the next five years.
“These principles will help us make the right decisions when we are planning for future demand and ensure that the decision making process is fair, transparent and easy to understand.
“We’d like to hear from as many interested parties as possible.”
However, the proposed building of new houses has been met with anger from countryside campaigners who say plans affect protected green belt land.
Geoff Lambert – chairman of the Beds branch of the Campaign to Protect Rural England – called for the council to reconsider their proposals.
He said: “We fought hard in the past to get this land designated as green belt so that we and future generations would have the assurance it was protected from development.
“The south of Bedfordshire was specifically identified as needing this extra level of protection, and that need remains as strong today as it ever was.”
To have your say on school places, complete the online questionnaire at www.centralbedfordshire.gov.uk. The consultation will run until January 4, 2013.