North Hertfordshire District Council
North Hertfordshire District Council is the local authority for the North Hertfordshire non-metropolitan district of England, the United Kingdom. North Hertfordshire covers the northern part of Hertfordshire, in the East of England region. The Council's offices are in Letchworth, one of the largest settlements in the district. Composition. The Council consists of 49 elected members, representing twenty-four electoral wards. Nine of the wards elect two councillors each. Seven elect one, whilst eight elect three. The Council has been under no overall control since 2019, being run by a Labour and Liberal Democrats joint  administration. In the 2021 Council elections Labour lost the Letchworth Grange seat to the Conservative party. A total of 17 seats out of the 49 of the council were contested, including 2 bye-elections. The 16 other seats were held by the incumbent party. Political leadership. Since the Local Government Act 2000, the council has used the 'Leader and cabinet' model. The current leader, appointed in May 2021, is Elizabeth Dennis-Harburg (Labour, leading a Labour - Liberal Democrat coalition). Prior to 2000 the term 'leader' was used to indicate the leader of the largest political group, who in North Hertfordshire  took the formal role of Chair of the Policy and Resources Committee. Wards. North Hertfordshire consists of twenty four wards, electing 1, 2 or 3 members. Premises. When the council was created in 1974, it inherited five sets of offices from the five former authorities, spread across the four towns of Hitchin, Letchworth, Baldock and Royston. Initially the new council used the former Hitchin Rural District Council's offices (later called Centenary House) on Grammar School Walk in Hitchin as its headquarters, with the other offices providing additional accommodation. In 1975, the year after the new council's creation, it  consolidated most of its functions into a six-storey building on Gernon Road in Letchworth, which had been built as part of the Central Area (later Garden Square) Shopping Centre. The building was named Council Offices and has served as the council's headquarters since then. The council rented the building until 2013, when it purchased it for £3.6 million. Logo. In 2021 the council adopted a new logo of four hearts (shown in the infobox above) and the style "North Herts Council" instead of its full formal name of "North Hertfordshire District Council". Prior to this, the council  had used a logo of the initials "NHDC" in a green and purple square for approximately thirty years.