Agenda item

            (Mrs. M. Higgins, Lead Officer – Community Provision, attended in connection with this item.)

 

            The Committee considered the following report:

 

“1.0      Purpose of Report or Summary of main Issues

 

1.1             The purpose of this paper is to:

 

·        Provide information requested by members at P&C committee meeting in October 22.

 

2.0       Recommendations

 

2.1       The Committee is asked to:

 

·        Note the contents of the report.

 

3.0       Main report

 

3.1       Background

 

            At October committee members requested that officers present the following information:

 

1.     Analysis of how capacity and revenue grants had been allocated on a geographic basis previously.

2.      Identification of capacity issues including potential solutions to this in terms of enhancing/increasing capacity to apply for, and be successful in availing of, these grants.

3.      Further breakdown in relation to community of interest/targeting of section 75 groups.

 

3.2       Geographic analysis of awards

 

            Council made the decision to make some level of award to all applications that were received through the last open call for Capacity and Revenue funding in 20/21. Awards were made across 4 bands with the allocation being linked to the score achieved, further detail on the allocations is provided below. The quality threshold was 50%.  Members agreed to include a 4th funding band for groups falling below the quality threshold.

 

Capacity Building
Funding Band	Scores	Maximum Award	Number of Applicants	Potential Allocation
1	70% and above	Up to £42,000	13	£548,600
2	60-69%	Up to £28,150	10	£281,500
3	50-59%	Up to £23,500	10	£235,000
4	49% and Below	Up to £9,700	1	£9,700
Revenue
Funding Band	Scores	Maximum Award	Number of Applicants	Potential Allocation
1	70% and above	Up to £18,000	30	£558,000
2	60-69%	Up to £13,000	26	£338,000
3	50-59%	Up to £9,000	20	£180,000
4	49% and Below	Up to £3,000	8	£24,000

 

            A breakdown of awards by geographic area and community of interest and the band that they were awarded funding is provided below. The highlighted row indicates the % allocation that each area would receive if the current population/deprivation figures were used.

 

3.3

Capacity Building Grant

 

	North	South	East	West	Total
% Allocation using Area model	25%	17%	24%	34%	100%
% of Successful Capacity Building Applications by Area	29.41%	26.47%	14.71%	29.41%	100%
Number of Organisations	10	9	5	10	34
Level of Award by Funding Band	B1-3	B1-3	B1-3	B1-4	B1-13
	B2-4	B2-2	B2-2	B2-2	B2-10
	B3-2	B3-4	B3-0	B3-4	B3-10
	B4-1	B4-0	B4-0	B4-0	B4-1
Allocation	£288,138.00	£276,900.00	£168,850.00	£287,448.12	£1,021,336.12

 

3.4

Revenue Grants for Community Buildings

 

	North	South	East	West	Total
% Allocation using Area Model	25%	17%	24%	34%	100%
% of Successful Revenue Applications by Area	33.33%	14.29%	11.90%	40.48%	100%
Number of Organisations	28	12	10	34	84
Level of Award by Funding Band	B1 -10	B1-2	B1-4	B1-14	B1-30
	B2-7	B2-5	B2-4	B2-10	B2-26
	B3-11	B3-1	B3-1	B3-7	B3-20
	B4-0	B4-4	B4-1	B4-3	B4-8
Allocation	£322,973.79	£122,000.00	£127,733.00	£412,698.84	£985,405.63

 

3.5       Identification and Response to Capacity issues

 

            Council officers previously carried out an analysis of capacity issues with a range of community organisations in Summer/Autumn 2019. At that point the priority areas, as identified by the sector, were:

 

·        Ensuring compliance with GDPR

·        Financial planning

·        Ensuring appropriate policies/procedures are in place

 

            Council officers currently respond to these, and other identified needs, by providing mentoring support and training to groups and the team has also developed 3 toolkits; Running a Community Organisation, Facilities Management, and Collaborative Working, to support organisations. Officers will also support groups to access external funding opportunities.

 

            Furthermore, the recent introduction of the micro/medium grant approach allowed 115 new organisations to access funding and develop experience in delivering small scale programmes in 20/21, 21/22 and 22/23.

 

            Officers provide support for groups who wish to make applications for a range of Council funding and grants opportunities. In advance of the recent round of capacity and revenue funding officers provided 1-2-1 guidance to applicants, and also held 5 Information sessions with a total of 94 representatives from a wide range of organisations attending these sessions.

 

            The sector has been significantly impacted by Covid 19 and the cost-of-living crisis which has seen many organisations review their areas of priority. Increasing costs have also created challenges with some organisations having to reduce their hours of operation. Community Development Officers and other staff are in regular contact with organisations at a local level and are aware of the challenges that they are experiencing.

 

            Once decisions have been made in relation to the 23/26 Capacity and Revenue funding awards, officers will make contact with those organisations who were unsuccessful in receiving funding and offer support for them to plan services and access support through other means.

 

            As per the City & Neighbourhood Department’s 3-Year Business Plan, as well as in support of the draft actions identified under the ‘Community and Neighbourhood Regeneration’ theme of the Belfast Agenda Refresh 22-26 (e.g. ‘Develop models for capacity building across all sectors and mainstream learning across the city’), officers will continue to review, revise and refresh our approaches to building capacity, and provision of community development support, working alongside stakeholders to ensure we are incorporating good/ best practice and responding to current and emerging needs.

 

3.6       Communities of interest/targeting of Section 75 groups

 

            Capacity and Revenue Grants are administered through the Central Grants Unit within Council. Grants are widely advertised, and information is shared with officers from across council who can raise awareness of funding opportunities with groups and partners that they work with. The availability of these grants is promoted through a campaign which includes the placing of advertisements in local and regional newspapers as well as promotion across Belfast City Council’s website, social media and officer networks.  Applications to the Capacity & Revenue Grants, as with all grants through the Central Grants Unit, are open and equitable to all eligible organisations.

 

            In addition, as outlined in 3.6, information sessions are held to provide further detail on the criteria and application process.

 

            Council does not collect information specific to applications from S75 groups or community of interest groups. However, officers have carried out an analysis of the applications supported in the 2020/21 round of Capacity and Revenue funding which shows that 12% of Capacity Building and 16% of Revenue awards were made to organisations working with identified/or easily identifiable communities of interest.  Capacity grant awardees included 2 BME, 1 LGBTQ+ and 1 Women's Group, and Revenue grant awardees included 8 Women's Centres, 3 BME and 2 Special Needs.

 

            Prior to the advertising of the 23/26 Revenue and Capacity Grants Programme, officers sought approval from committee to ensure that the definition of ‘community’ within the guidance and criteria for the programme was extended to include communities of interest and as a result the guidance stated that the grants scheme was open to ‘community development organisations that support, advocate and take action in relation to the interests of their members and communities, where communities will be defined as geographic communities and/or communities of interest.’

 

3.7       Current applications

 

            An initial analysis of the number of applications received for the 23/26 programme is outlined in the table below and shows the number of applications received by area compared with the area allocation model which is used for some council funding and is based on figures for population size and levels of deprivation within DEAs.  Please note that these are initial figures that may differ once applications have been considered and scored (i.e. when the assessment stages is complete). It is worth noting that some organisations who previously applied have not on this occasion and that there is also a total of 27 new applicants to the 23/26 grant programmes, (18 – Revenue, 9 Capacity).

 

Area	Capacity	Revenue	Total	Allocation per area based on population size and deprivation	Capacity and Revenue Total %
North	12	26	38	25%	28.8%
South	10	14	24	17%	18.2%
East	6	11	17	24%	12.9%
West	15	38	53	34%	40.2%
Total	43	89	132	100%	100%

 

            Officers will bring an update on the outcome of 23/26 application assessments to committee with options for an allocation approach in December 2022.

 

3.8       Financial Implications

 

            All activity outlined in this report can be delivered within existing budgets.

 

3.9S     Equality or Good Relations Implications

            and Rural Needs Assessment

 

            No issues have been identified at present. Any implications will be considered throughout and highlighted to Members.”

 

            Several Members referred to the differing levels of allocation across the District Electoral Areas (DEAs) with discussion around South Belfast, specifically the low number of applications from the Balmoral area.

 

            Discussion ensued regarding the ongoing issues that some organisations and groups had with capacity and how they could be assisted to optimize their ability to access the funding streams available.

 

            During discussion the Members noted that there were often significant variances in the capacity from one group to another, with many simply not having the expertise to fill in the application forms as they were such small groups/organisations. 

 

            A Member encouraged the other Elected Members to liaise with these groups to ensure that they were aware of any funding opportunities and to also signpost them to where assistance might be available. 

 

            A further Member referred to the fact that monitoring statistics were not available for either geographic groups or Section 75 Groups. 

 

            Another Member also asked officers to investigate any assistance that might be available to people from the deaf community to help them with the application process.

 

            The Lead Officer – Community Provision, advised that applications to these funding programmes were made via the online grants platform. Although the system sought information on the geographic and Section 75 background of participants this information was not regularly provided by applicants. She undertook to engage with the Central Grants Unit to explore ways in which this information could be sought on a mandatory basis. However, she advised that this could not be completed retrospectively and that it would take some time to amend the online system. 

 

            The Committee noted the update and agreed that officers would include an analysis of allocations on a DEA level in the December report and that they would engage with the Central Grants Unit to explore ways to gather and report on information on applicants from geographic and Section 75 backgrounds for future rounds of funding.