Bolton Community and Voluntary Services: End of Year Report on Grants Administered from The BIG Bolton Fund April 2014 - March 2015 Contents Foreword 1 Small Grants Programme - Introduction 3 - June 2014 4 - September 2014 7 - November 2014 11 - March 2014 14 Breaks for Carers Grants 18 Hate Crime Awareness Grants 21 £100 Challenge Grants 23 Foreword Welcome to our 2014/15 review of the grants administered by Bolton CVS. We are delighted to report that during the year 288 awards were made worth a total of £213,704.39. You will see on the following pages the hugely varied range of work that local voluntary organisations and community groups carry out to help build stronger, safer, healthier and greener communities in our town. Throughout the report are mini-case studies offering greater detail about how the funds are being put to very good use for the benefit of the people of Bolton. We must offer a big thank you to our funders as we again were able to offer four separate grant programmes for the second consecutive year. Firstly, to Bolton Council who have continued to provide excellent support for small grants through the Chief Executive’s Department, the Public Health Team and the Department of Children’s and Adult Services. We have also been pleased to continue work with the Be Safe Bolton Community Safety Partnership and Barclays Bank Bolton and we have received new support from Bolton at Home to deliver another £100 Challenge for community organisations at Christmas. We are very grateful to everyone who continues to support the BIG Bolton Fund Investment scheme. By making some new investments this year we hope that the income from this will make an increasing contribution to our work. Many thanks, also, to the staff at Bolton CVS for making the grants schemes work so effectively and to our volunteer grant assessors, whose time and expertise continues to be invaluable. The Small Grants Programme is our main fund and this year made 152 awards. It is an integrated grant scheme, which enables community organisations to receive one grant per year of up to £1500 in order to benefit people in Bolton. Funding for the Small Grants Programme in 2014/15 came from several sources: • Bolton Council’s Chief Executive’s Department: £150,050.11 • Bolton Council’s Public Health Team: £ 23,281.86 • Literacy, Numeracy and ICT Fund: £ 6,030.09 ---------------- Total: £179,362.06 Priority is given to organisations whose annual income is below £25,000, with over 96% of the funds awarded to such groups. It is important that the funding reaches those most in need and we are pleased that more than 70% of the money has gone toward activities benefiting the most deprived areas of Bolton or people living with disabilities. However, the fund is available to all areas of Bolton and this year organisations from all 20 wards of Bolton accessed the fund. The Breaks for Carers Grants Fund has continued to be funded by Bolton Council’s Children’s and Adult Services Department to enable those with caring responsibilities for family members or friends to get a short break from their daily commitments. Community groups received awards of up to £1000 to support their 1 activities. This fund runs with a financial year from September to August, meaning we gave 8 grants from April to August and a further 9 from September to March with groups receiving £13,661.25 in total. The grant fund we administered on behalf of the Be Safe Bolton Community Safety Partnership enabled Bolton community groups to carry out activities in support of Greater Manchester Hate Crime Awareness Week 2015 in January. This year the focus was on projects that would produce media and other resources that could be used to continue to raise awareness into the future. Groups were again extremely creative in making songs, videos and artwork that covered many of the hate crime strands. 11 grants were made with a value of £9,981.08. Finally The £100 Challenge was so popular in the previous year that we ran it again. We were grateful for contributions from Bolton Council, Bolton at Home and Barclays Bank Bolton who match funded the donations we received from our AGM raffle. We were able to top this up with income from the BIG Bolton Fund investment scheme which meant we were able to award £10,700 to support 107 outstanding ideas by local groups who reached out to benefit the people of Bolton over the Christmas and winter period with just £100 each plus a huge amount of voluntary labour. The ‘Bolton State of the Voluntary Sector 2013’ report (carried out in partnership with Sheffield Hallam University) estimated that there are 1,418 voluntary organisations and community groups here in Bolton and that 1,110 of these groups are classed as ‘micro’, i.e. they have an income of under £10,000 a year. The same survey estimated that there are 32,300 volunteers active within Bolton contributing 100,900 of voluntary effort per week. These small groups and their volunteers give their time freely to improve the everyday lives of people in Bolton and it is vital that we continue to assist them to do this by providing the small grants that help to maximise this activity and bring new ideas to life. For further information you can access the report on the Bolton CVS website: http://www.boltoncvs.org.uk/bolton-state-sector-survey- report If you would like to know more about the Bolton CVS grants programme, or if you would like to donate any funds, please contact Mark Grundy, Grants Coordinator at Bolton CVS on 01204 546026/546010 or via email [email protected] Karen Minnitt Chief Executive Bolton CVS (Community and Voluntary Services) The Bolton Hub Bold Street Bolton, BL1 1LS Telephone: 01204 546010 E-mail: [email protected] Web: www.boltoncvs.org.uk Facebook: www.facebook.com/CVSBolton Twitter: @boltoncvs 2 Bolton CVS Small Grants Programme Through this programme, which is our largest, Bolton CVS works in partnership with Bolton Council’s Chief Executive’s and Public Health Departments to offer grants of up to £1500 for community organisations based or working in any area of Bolton. Smaller groups with an annual income of under £25,000 are prioritised. We are especially keen to support projects which benefit those most in need, particularly: people living in the poorest communities in Bolton people with disabilities people whose opportunities are limited by other factors such as a lack of local facilities or activities or a lack of skills. The aims of the projects we fund are aligned to Bolton Vision Partnership’s Strategic Aims and fall into four broad categories: Healthier Communities • Encouraging people to be more physically active, eat more healthily or reduce alcohol consumption. • Supporting people to have a better quality of life e.g. improved mental health or be less socially isolated. • Helping people to manage existing conditions and increase their independence. Communities that Achieve • Enabling people of all ages to develop new skills with the aim of increasing educational or employment opportunities, e.g. Job search & CV building, homework clubs, work & study skills training. • Improvement of numeracy, literacy or Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills among those who currently struggle with these. Stronger and Safer Communities • Supporting people to get involved in their local communities - enabling people to know and meet with others or be more active in their communities. • Supporting people to engage in positive activities to help prevent crime and anti social behaviour. • Promoting interaction between people from different faiths, cultures or ages. • Providing opportunities for young or old people to get together in a safe environment. • Reducing the impact of poverty. Cleaner and Greener Communities • Making public spaces and facilities cleaner, brighter and more useable. • Encouraging awareness of sustainable living (e.g. recycling, food growing, effective use of resources.) Grants are awarded four times per year and on the following pages you can find a list of all our awards and some small case studies of our funded projects. 3 Bolton CVS Small Grants Programme - June 2014 1) Adult Bolton Aspergers Group Running costs of monthly meetings for adults with the learning difficulty Aspergers Syndrome. £980.49 2) African Community Association Of Bolton Costs to cover rent at Bolton YMCA for African group with members from all across Bolton. £1500 3) Association of Bolton Allotment Societies IT and stationery costs to enable the association to communicate with and represent the allotments of Bolton. £1341.17 4 ) B-Muzik Costs towards SummerZone, a collaborative daily project for young people during the summer holidays ay Harmony Youth Centre in Halliwell. £1490 5) Bolton Deane and Derby Cricket and Social Club Costs towards a cricket tournament for young people aged 16-18 from Farnworth, Great Lever and Rumworth. £1209 6) Bolton FM CIC Purchase of new equipment to improve the station's ability to reliably do outside broadcasts from all across the Bolton borough. £1500 7) Bolton French African Assistance (BOFAA) IT and sound equipment and general costs of community meetings for French speaking Africans living in Bolton, including a one off Health Care Event to increase their awareness of how to look after themselves and stay healthy. £1500 8) Bolton Language School Purchase of desktop computers and stationery for use by students with English as a second language to improve employability. £1455 9) Bolton's Ear 4 Kidz organised a monthly cookery class at The Wellbeing Farm in Edgworth for a group of 12 children with hearing difficulties. The children were involved in making food with balanced nutrition and looked at the importance of vegetables in their diets.