How to maintain a strong local identity through place leadership in the age of devolution

A strong sense of place is core to the mission and purpose of local government.

Our role is to act as anchors, stewards, and conveners of the local system, supporting elected members and partner organisations to improve people’s quality of life and ensure places thrive. 

Establishing a ‘place identity’ empowers local leaders to promote and lobby for their communities’ interests regionally and nationally, and to make decisions that reflect local needs.

We know that it’s really important to avoid complacency and to not assume our role as a council is accepted. Instead, we need to earn trust and faith through deep and meaningful engagement over time. This approach ensures local voices remain central to devolved decision-making, helps build cohesion across communities and gives our work legitimacy – so people see their local leaders as authentic representatives of their interests.

When people feel connected to their place – its history, culture, landscape and communities – they’re more likely to support local decision-making and trust local decision-makers.

Trust is vital in local government, and there is strong evidence to support this.

From 2018, our team at Calderdale worked in partnership with local people and organisations to create a shared sense of direction for our borough that drew deeply on its identity.

This work resulted in Vision 2024 – a powerful tool that defines our place and captures the spirit of our distinctive, kind, resilient, talented and enterprising community.

This work gave Calderdale a shared sense of belonging.

Vision 2034: How Did We Did It

In late 2022, a group of local leaders from across statutory, business, voluntary and community sectors, called the Calderdale Place Leaders, agreed a process to refresh Vision 2024.

We wanted to create a clear vision to strengthen community partnerships, build confidence, and ensure our borough’s strengths and values were harnessed for the next decade. 

The aim was to provide a long-term destination for everyone to work towards, shaped by our communities and prioritising continuity. This was particularly important post-pandemic, in response to the cost-of-living crisis and increased polarisation in our neighbourhoods. 

Led by our Director of Public Health, a stakeholder group and in partnership with the Ideas Alliance, we undertook an 18-month process of deep and deliberative community engagement, listening and co-creating stories of our place in the future.  

Community-led engagement: story gathering

Place leaders agreed that the development of a new vision would focus on ‘appreciative enquiry’ and ‘imagining’ techniques that recognised stories and images gathered from conversations with residents about the best things in the borough.

We collected hundreds of stories reflecting residents’ experiences and aspirations, telling us where they wanted to be in 10 years.

Using a ‘snowballing’ approach, conversations took place with an initial group of people, who introduced us to others with stories to share, organically expanding into groups not previously engaged with, such as marginalised communities and younger voices. This allowed the engagement to reach more deeply into communities and include stories from people who are seldom heard.  

Our approach evolved into a wide-reaching network, capturing diverse perspectives, building a comprehensive, authentic narrative of what people see as Calderdale’s strengths and values captured in eight key words: heritage, nature, creativity, hope, opportunity, kind, welcoming and enterprising. 

Ongoing and future impact

We can only achieve this vision when we work together with our communities and other organisations as one place.

Through partnerships with local businesses, schools, Family Hubs and community organisations, Vision 2034 has become a living, community-owned framework shaping Calderdale’s future, owned not just by the Council, but all our partners, informing their strategic work. 

Drawing from hundreds of collected stories, our in-house design team developed two brand concepts, tested with nearly 300 people through focus groups, surveys and feedback sessions.

The resulting My Calderdale Story brand blends storytelling with a sense of belonging, reflecting the vision’s celebration of individual voices within a shared identity.

Our annual We Are Calderdale event will highlight progress, gather feedback and strengthen partnerships, while a new website provides a platform for people to contribute and share their stories. This digital space will foster pride, connection and continuous community engagement.

Looking ahead, we will continue working with people and partners to bring our community-driven Vision 2034 to life. By broadening our strengths-based approaches and commitment to a joint vision that belongs to everyone, we will ensure the vision remains inclusive, responsive and reflective of Calderdale’s aspirations, fostering a thriving future for generations to come.

We believe that people who feel rooted in their place are more likely to participate in civic life – voting, volunteering, and taking part in consultations. This engagement strengthens democratic processes and ensures devolved powers are exercised in ways that continue to reflect local needs. A strong sense of place can lead to deeper social networks and local knowledge. We can harness these to drive innovation, respond to challenges and build resilience, which is especially important in these uncertain times.

With uncertain times come difficult decisions. We need to engage our communities in this decision-making and bring them along with us. We work with our communities, not for them.

The creation of Vision 2034 was a way for us to take a different approach – not local government-driven, but from the ground up, reaching out to and listening to local people to understand what they need.

The closer our relationship with communities, the better we represent the majority, the better we represent our place and its aspirations, the better we vocalise what people want at a regional and national level, and the better we can make devolution truly work. 

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