Deadline: 2-Aug-22
The Leeds Community Foundation is seeking applications for its Community Partnering Fund which focused on supporting Community Organisations with innovative approaches to delivering sustainable initiatives that help broaden Northern Powergrid’s reach, and educate and support communities and individuals.
Leeds Community Foundation is delighted to be working with Northern Powergrid to enable community groups to deliver schemes that tackle priority issues. As well as providing a short-term funding boost, they want to find organisations who can become the long-term partners. By working with groups who are embedded in their local communities, they can have much bigger impact.
Objectives
- Alleviating hardship associated with fuel poverty and promoting innovative energy-related environmental impact and energy efficiency This can include an element of food and fuel support, such as vouchers, but should be fully rounded to include training, support and signposting that will better equip people to understand and manage energy usage
- Supporting Community Hubs with crisis planning – strengthening organisations to more confidently navigate challenges for themselves and their communities, such as power cuts caused by adverse weather
- Developing learning pathways/support in Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths subjects and related career opportunities – not just for children and young people, but people who are under-represented in related careers, such as women and people from minority ethnic backgrounds
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Supporting communities to lower their carbon footprint – this can include ideas for decarbonising your own community organisation alongside offering advice and support to individuals and communities to take practical steps, such as,
- Decarbonising your own premises
- Reducing waste and increasing recycling
- Gaining a greater understanding of energy use and management
- Using local supply chains and services,
- Raising awareness about new technology that can help.
Prioritises
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They will prioritise projects that:
- Are run by local people, for local people – your group needs to demonstrate good local links
- Can show a strong understanding of/consultation around local needs and responds to these
- Will have a direct impact on the community and local needs
- Are not one-off events and could become sustainable in the longer term
- Focus on supporting those living in vulnerable circumstances and/or facing barriers to other services
Funding Information
- Grants of between £1,000 and £10,000 are available to cover a period of 12 months.
- Grants of up to £20,000 are available to cover a period of 24 months, with the grant amount split equally across the two years.
Activity
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Examples of activity that can be funded:
- A Community Organisation partners with a food bank to offer energy efficiency and fuel debt advice, helps people sign up to the PSM, and uses part of their grant to offer direct support via fuel vouchers for people experiencing hardship.
- A Community Hub pays for a consultant to work with them to prepare for a power cut, including creating information and response packs for local residents.
- A Community Organisation delivers a programme of workshops for young women aged 18 to 30 that develops their understanding and experience of engineering. The workshops are enhanced with a series of guest speaker events, introducing participants to female role models representing different careers in engineering.
- A Community Hub works towards becoming a ‘greener’ building and local resource by a) expanding their community garden to include a composting scheme, equipping residents to collect and compost reusable garden/food waste b) investing in solar panels for the building, generating electricity independently and reducing dependence on fossil fuels.
Eligibility Criteria
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Incorporated community groups such as CIOs, CICs and charitable companies from the third sector that:
- Are registered with the Charity Commission, Companies House or Mutuals Public Register (FCA)
- Have a constitution or other relevant governance document
- Are limited by guarantee, not shares (for CICs and companies)
- Have a management committee/board of directors/trustees of at least three unrelated people, none of whom have significant control
- Have a bank account under the name of the group with at least two unrelated signatories
- Are based in or supporting people living in the areas identified
- Charities that are registered with the Charity Commission but are not an incorporated structure can also apply. They must also fulfil the bullet points. However, grants cannot be used to pay staff that are directly employed by the charity.
- Small unincorporated and unregistered community groups can apply for a maximum of £5,000. Unincorporated, unregistered groups can only apply if their annual income is less than £10,000, and if securing the grant does not take them this threshold for the year.
For more information, visit Leeds Community Foundation.
For more information, visit https://www.leedscf.org.uk/grants/community-partnering-fund-3/