Devon, Cornwall & Somerset Young Planners

Elliot is a Planner at Stantec (Taunton) with keen interests in Economic Development and Infrastructure. He has advised a diverse range of clients on planning applications, town centre and economic strategies, and land promotions, amongst other things.

He is a massive advocate for ambassadorship as a means to raise awareness of planning and build capacity in the industry, when paired with a greater range of more accessible routes into the profession. Because of this, he is actively involved in the Somerset Cornerstone Employer Network, co-leads Stantec’s local School Outreach programme and sits on the RTPI’s South West Careers and Education Working Group.

Elliot is Past Chair of the Devon, Cornwall and Somerset Young Planners.

Jess is a Chartered Town Planner with over 10 years public and private sector planning experience. Jess currently works as a Senior Planner for Carney Sweeney in the Exeter office, recently moving from Collier Planning based in Taunton.

Previous to this, Jess worked at East Devon District Council, where she was part of the Cranbrook Team dealing with strategic planning matters for the new town of Cranbrook.

During her career, Jess has dealt with a variety of applications within the Southwest and is experienced in working within multi-disciplinary teams progressing all types of development proposals through the planning process. Her work currently includes the preparation of development appraisals, planning statements, appeal statements and negotiating with planning authorities in respect of development proposals.

Liam is a Chartered Town Planner and is currently a Senior Planning Officer within the Cranbrook and Major Projects Team at East Devon District Council. Liam has over 6 years’ experience and has previously worked at Bristol City Council and DPP Planning Ltd.

Since graduating from Cardiff University in 2018, Liam has worked on a mixture of applications across in public and private roles and currently manages large scale housing delivery and employment schemes in East Devon.  

Liam has been a member of the Devon, Cornwall and Somerset Young Planners Steering Group since April 2022 and was elected to Vice Chair in 2025.

Prutha is an architect from India. Following her passion for planning and design Prutha then embarked on RTPI accredited Urban Planning and Design course at University of Sheffield. During masters Prutha gained work experience through internships and volunteering. Prutha joined Somerset council as Case officer in October 2023 in the Shepton Mallet office. Outside working hours Prutha loves exploring, painting and reading. 

Since completing her MSc Planning degree at the University of Plymouth in 2018 Faye has been working as a Town Planner in a multi-disciplinary team at Bailey Partnership.  Faye was elected as a Chartered Member of the RTPI in September 2022, and has now secured the role of Senior Town Planner within the company.

During her career Faye has dealt with a variety of applications within the South West of the UK, across public and private sectors including: retail; leisure; education; healthcare; residential; and listed buildings.  These have ranged from small scale building conversions to major housing developments.  Faye is committed to delivering high quality place making in a way that protects our environment.

Faye is also part of the RTPI South West Young Planners Devon, Cornwall and Somerset Steering Group, having been a volunteer with this group since 2020.

I have been a planning officer at Torridge District Council since December 2021. Although a new planner I graduated with a degree in Environmental Sciences in 1996 and a Masters in Water Resources. I worked as a hydrologist for 7 years for both Thames Water and a number of other consultancy firms in both the South-East and South West. I then retrained as a secondary geography teacher and taught A level Geography in the FE Sector for the last 14 years in Barnstaple. I enjoy learning and being challenged and have found both in equal measure over the last 18 months. It soon became apparent that the sector is lacking trained professionals and I would like to be more involved in helping promote a career in planning more widely, especially encouraging making it more flexible to re-train. I enjoy running and taking part in other outdoor activities along with the rest of the family although in the past few years football seems to have taken over our lives at the weekends.