Community Spaces invites applications for large and flagship grants
Howard Lake | 1 September 2008 | News
Having launched earlier this year by providing smaller grants, Community Spaces, a £50 million Lottery-funded programme managed by Groundwork UK, is now inviting applications for Large and Flagship Grants. There is a single application round and four Large Grants of between £50,000 and £100,000 and one Flagship Grant of between £100,001 and £450,000 will be available in each region in England.
The Big Lottery Fund has provided the money for the programme under its £234 million Changing Spaces initiative to help communities enjoy and improve their local environments.
What’s on offer with Large and Flagship Grants?
Application is open to not for profit organisations throughout England. Applications cannot be made by statutory organisations including schools, health bodies or parish or town councils. Partnership working is a must both at local and regional level.
All projects must be within a 2-mile radius of a residential area and must be open to the public “most of the time”.
All projects must meet all four of the following outcomes:
• Better local environments;
• An increase in people’s access to quality local spaces for interaction, play and recreation;
• An increase in people actively involved in developing and running a practical environmental project that is visible in their community;
• Improved partnerships between support organisations, communities and authorities.
The following are some examples of projects that Community Spaces will fund: Community gardens and parks; Informal sports areas and multi-use games areas; Nature reserves; Churchyards; Ponds; Housing landscape; Play areas; Orchards; City farms; Woodlands; Canal side improvements; Cycle path routes.
This list is not exhaustive and Community Spaces will fund other kinds of activity that meet the programme’s general criteria. Given the size of these larger grants it is also likely that successful projects will combine more than one of the above.
Amongst the activities that specifically will not be are: Projects on school grounds; Projects based on statutory allotments; Projects without reasonable physical access for the general public; Anything that is the statutory responsibility of other organisations; Formal sports pitches; The purchase of land; Facilities for, and the purchase of, animals; The purchase, construction, refurbishment of, or access to, buildings.
What can you get and when?
Large Grants of between £50,000 and £100,000 will not require any match funding. If you do have match funding it can amount to no more than 50% of the total project cost.
Flagship Grants of between £100,001 and £450,000 require at least £50,000 of match funding.
Grants will cover capital costs, with a maximum of 25% to be allowable for revenue-related spending. No more than 25% of the grant can be spent on CCTV, security, lighting and car parking.
All projects must be completed by December 2012.
Can I still get a Small or Medium Grant?
Yes, Small Grants of between £10,000 and £25,000 and Medium Grants of between £25,001 and £49,999 can be applied for at any time over the next three years or so. It is anticipated that around 1000 projects will be supported and, since the money will be spent over three years, applicants are encouraged to apply only when they have a well thought through project in mind. Groups will have access to trained Facilitators to help them turn ideas into reality. Around 200 applications have already been received.
How to apply.
There is a two-stage application process.
Application packs for Large and Flagship Grants, and Small and Medium Grants are available at
www.community-spaces.org.uk/Apply
There is also a telephone hotline on 0845 3671 671 or you can e-mail
in**@co**************.uk
but these only provide information, you cannot get application forms this way as you have to pass an online eligibility test first.
Community Spaces
Groundwork UK
Lockside
5 Scotland Street
Birmingham
B1 2RR
Closing date: Stage 1 applications for Large Grants have to be in by 9 January 2009. The date for Flagship Grants is 30 January 2009.
Applications continue to be accepted at any time for Small and Medium Grants. It will take 12 weeks to process applications beyond the deadline dates.
This information is provided by Fundinginformation.org, the online news, information and support service for fundraisers and funding advisers throughout the UK. For subscription details go to
www.fundinginformation.org
Advertisement
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.