Reducing Social Isolation for Seniors Grant Program in Australia

Deadline: 19-Sep-22

The New South Wales Government has launched the Reducing Social Isolation for Seniors Grants program focuses on supporting local communities to establish ongoing connections between older people to promote inclusion and combat isolation and loneliness.

The Reducing Social Isolation for Seniors Grant Program is an initiative to address social isolation for older people. It funds projects that support seniors to connect with others and address the challenges that contribute to social isolation.

Objectives

The objectives of the Reducing Social Isolation for Seniors grant program are to:

• Reduce social isolation for older people aged 65 years and over, or 50 years and over for Aboriginal people
• Support effective, self-sustaining projects that provide meaningful and lasting social connection opportunities for older people who are socially isolated or at risk of isolation
• Support projects that help older people connect and actively engage with each other through small group activities (e.g. interest groups, social events or environmental activities) that bring them together in person throughout the year and enable them to develop quality relationships that can be maintained beyond these activities
• Support projects and activities that seek to actively engage new people, particularly harder-to-reach socially isolated older people.

Priorities

The Grant encourages a focus on older people from the following priority groups due to these groups being considered at higher risk of social isolation:

• Aboriginal people aged 50 years and over
• from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds
• lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer or asexual (LGBTIQA+)
• People living with disability, dementia, chronic disease or mental illness
• Carers
• People in rural, regional and remote areas.

Grant Categories

• Category 1 – Creation grants
  • Create a new innovative short term program that fosters social inclusion, targets older people and advances the Ageing Well in NSW: Seniors Strategy 2021-2031
  • Improve opportunities for older people to engage and connect with their communities, through innovative projects.
• Category 2 – Enhancement and/or expansion grants
  • Enhance a successful program that fosters social inclusion to now target older people aged 65 years and over, or 50 years and over for Aboriginal people.
  • Expand a successful program that fosters social inclusion targeted to older people into a new geographical area or to target a new cohort (for example, rural and remote areas, CALD or LGBTQIA+).
  • Enhance or expand projects that can successfully start delivery as soon as the grant is provided, minimising long set up times and be delivered in full in 12 months.
• Category 3 – Local council grants only
  • To work with local councils who have the knowledge, skills, resources and capacity to work in this area.
  • For councils with professional expertise, who have capacity and are well-placed to understand community need and generate positive outcomes for older people.

Funding Information

One off funding will be available under three funding categories totalling $600,000 for this program, including:

• Category 1: Creation grants are for new innovative projects, with $20,000 to five innovative projects with an overall value of $100,000.
• Category 2: Enhancement and/or expansion grants target known projects that work, with $30,000 each for 10 different organisations with an overall value of $300,000.
• Category 3: Local council grants are available to local councils, with $50,000 to four different councils with an overall value of $200,000.

Eligibility Criteria

• Reducing Social Isolation for Seniors Grant Program – Round Three applications must be from:
  • Incorporated not-for-profit communication organisations.
  • Other organisations or government agencies that are formally partnering with a not-for-profit organisation.
  • NSW local council operating under the Local Government Act 1993.
• For the purposes of this grant program, ‘incorporated not-for-profit community organisations’ include:
  • Incorporated organisations that are registered and approved as not-for-profit bodies by NSW Fair Trading.
  • Not-for profit companies limited by guarantee, registered in NSW (must have ACNC registration and/or DGR status).
  • Associations (registered under the Associations Incorporation Act 2009 with NSW Fair Trading).
  • NSW Local Aboriginal Land Councils.
  • Religious organisations operating in NSW.
  • NSW non-government organisations established under an Act of Parliament.

For more information, visit NSW.

For more information, visit https://www.facs.nsw.gov.au/inclusion/seniors/overview/chapters/what-we-are-doing-under-the-strategy/reducing-social-isolation-grant-program