Category: Funding

Funding for Integrated Transport

Funding, Transport Leave a comment

A few of you out there might be interested in this funding pot that supports (large scale and small scale) innovative transport solutions: FIT favours projects directed to achieve change on the ground, as opposed to reports and policy reviews.

  • Reducing car use for travel to leisure destinations

  • Supporting initiatives that change public attitudes to the car

  • Transforming the quality of the bus service in the UK

  • Supporting local communities that are campaigning to keep their bus services in the face of austerity cuts

  • Supporting grass roots community action for sustainable transport

  • Encouraging organisations active on environmental and social issues to adopt transport as one of their priorities

  • Making access to public transport as much of a human right as access to health or education

  • Making new and existing residential and business developments public transport friendly

  • Supporting the development of a high quality network of coach services for long distance travel, to complement rail services

More information here:

http://integratedtransport.co.uk/fit-social-investment-fund/ .

Contact details are info@integratedtransport.co.uk

Free Funding For Broken Gas Boiler Replacements 

Community, Energy, Funding Leave a comment

Residents on limited incomes could benefit from new funding to replace broken gas boilers this winter.  Herefordshire Council are one of only a handful of Councils nationally who are able to access the Emergency Central Heating Offer (ECHO) – delivered via the council’s energy advice service Keep Herefordshire Warm.  

A broken boiler during the winter months can be a worrying and stressful experience. For those in poor health, old age and with limited cash, the prospect of cold related ill health is very real – and many worry of ending up in hospital.  With widespread reports of pressures on the NHS in the winter months due to cold conditions, Herefordshire Council are keen to do all they can to help householders stay warm and safe in their homes. 

Robert, from Hereford, contacted Keep Herefordshire Warm after his old gas boiler broke down, leaving him and his wife without heating and hot water. Robert cares for his wife, relying on pensions and with little spare cash, they faced the prospect of entering the colder months without effective heating. He had been unable to access funding earlier in the year. 

Robert was referred for emergency support. Less than two weeks after contact was made a new boiler and radiators were installed throughout the home.   

The Keep Herefordshire Warm scheme provides free and impartial energy advice to local residents through an advice line, home visits and community events. Residents are supported to access grants to repair and replace heating and improve insulation. 

Many people are unaware of the risks that living in a cold home present to their health.  The risk of a stroke or heart attack rises, and other conditions such as colds and flu can become more likely. Just putting on another jumper or relying on one heater isn’t enough for many people. 

Keep Herefordshire Warm Project manager Oliver Rothwell said; 

“We often take calls from people concerned about neighbours or friends who are struggling – either with a crisis like a broken boiler, or often because they are facing daily decisions about whether to heat or eat. Many people struggle on with broken or intermittent systems, unaware that they could be eligible for help.  With the new Emergency Central Heating Offer and home visit support available, we hope to be in a position to help”. 

As well as funding for energy efficiency measures, the service can offer advice on energy tariffs and discounts, suppliers, and how to better use energy at home.  

The Keep Herefordshire Warm team can be contacted on Freephone 0800 677 1432 or through email at khw@mea.org.uk.  Advice is free and impartial to all residents, and covers a wide range of energy topics.  Funding is subject to eligibility criteria, and residents hoping to access funding will need to provide personal information such as their household income or the benefits they receive as part of an assessment. 

Funding for your activities…?

Community, Funding, Local Groups Leave a comment
community energy image
While Averil and Rebecca capably continue the day to day administration of HGN, the HGN Steering Group are in the process of putting together another round of funding applications to secure a bit more future for HGN and our work in the county – and we need your help…
The last major round of HGN funding was from Awards for All, and was aimed at providing some core development for HGN – including providing workshops to address needs you had all highlighted.
Now that we have a better level of organisational infrastructure in place, we’d like to make the focus of this next bid much more about support for your own work in local communities around Herefordshire.
…. Please could you answer a couple of questions for us:
  1. What do you see as the most pressing issues for your organisation or group?
  2. What are the most urgent issues affecting your community?
  3. What is the current focus of your organisation or group’s work?
  4. What would you like HGN to do in order to help you achieve your aims?
  5. What help do you need in order to work effectively with the issues affecting your community?
We would love to hear from a broad range of you in order to get a sense of what would genuinely be most useful as a next step for HGN.
We also have a few ideas for you:
  • In an HGN Steering Group meeting last week we wondered whether you might like support to develop your own community car share clubs, or community renewable energy / heat… ?
  • In discussions with other members of the HGN team we have wondered about developing the Repair Café / ‘Make Do and Mend’ model in Herefordshire as a way of bringing your local community together – the regular focus on repair, up-cycling and local food would provide a platform for deeper discussions within your community about environmental and energy issues. Would you be interested in receiving support to develop these activities in your area… ?
  • … Or do you have other very different ideas about what you would like funding to support.
…. Please let us know asap so that we can get this funding bid together soon … Ideally we would like to hear from you over the next 2 weeks.
Thank you 🙂

HGN receives new funding award!

Funding, Uncategorized Leave a comment

The HGN team are thrilled to have been awarded a grant from Greggs to support local Make Do & Mend initiatives at the Kindle Community Centre in Hereford.

The Make Do & Mend initiative will provide an inclusive regular ‘repair & recycling’ based event for the South Wye & Hereford City community. It is aimed at reducing waste, re-awakening the repair expertise of the local community, and supporting them with environmentally aware re-cycling & up-cycling fun – all alongside some healthy local seasonal cooking.

Following a successful Clothes Swap on Saturday 18 August, HGN will host 2 further Make Do & Mend events at the Kindle Centre: on Saturday 15 September, 10 am – 2pm and again on Saturday 13 October as part of h.Energy activities.

HGN are very grateful for the support of our partners with these activities: the Kindle Centre and Brightspace.

If you’d like to help others repair, upcycle, swap – please email events@hgnetwork.org.

 

Finding Funding

Events, Funding, HGN Events, Local Groups Leave a comment

Thank you to all for joining us at the Small Funds for Small Groups workshop yesterday.  We were buzzing with ideas by the end and all felt more confident in describing the impact of what we do, and writing funding bids.

Herefordshire Community Foundation gave us some useful insight into the funds available – and an open invitation to get in touch with any other questions we have.

There is a short summary below of some of the good advice for those that couldn’t make it…  and there’s more training in two weeks – Volunteer Recruitment – book on!

Clear Aims: A clear, simple aim for your project or organisation is so important! As are clear activities, and evidence that these activities will have an impact. Evidence could be as simple as a conversation. The simple template we used in the session is here

Many funds will need groups to be constituted. HVOSS can help with this – it’s a simple process. We the Network are are members so can access some of their services at a low (or no) cost.

Some funds that are more suitable for environmental projects:
Gillian Bulmer Fund, Becket Bulmer Fund and Glencora. Most funds are listed here

There is a new online form so the process is more streamlined now. If you’re not sure about where you fit – they are more than happy to talk to you.

If you’ve got a project that you think fits under the remit of Herefordshire Green Network and you’d like to be part of a larger HGN bid – please get in touch with Kate.

We’ll be running this workshop again in November, at the monthly gathering.  Hope to see you there.

FREE TRAINING – Fundraising and Recruiting Volunteers

Events, Funding, HGN Events, HGN news 2 comments

Do you ever find yourself wishing you had a few more people to carry out the great ideas, or a pot of money to do them with?

A couple of ways coming up that we can building our skills and resources…

Small Funds for Small Groups – a locally-focused workshop here in Herefordshire

10am to 1pm Monday 2nd July

The Kindle Centre, Hereford

We’ll:

  • Look at an example completed small grant application
  • Hear from Herefordshire Community Foundation about grants available right now
  • Identify grants that could help us make great activities for our h.Energy weekend
  • Work on the first step of our own applications – how we describe what we do, and the impact of it, so that a funder will listen!

Tea, coffee and pastries at the start!

You should leave with at least part of a funding bid written – well worth a morning’s reflection.

Places are free but limited – please book here and we’ll confirm your place by 22nd June.

If you’re raring to go now, here is a fund with a deadline in two weeks – if you’d like support completing it please email events@hgnetwork.org

Recruiting and Retaining Volunteers

July will see some free, live, online sessions with our events and publicity coordinator Rebecca who is also an experienced volunteer management trainer. All welcome!

Three lunchtimes: 17th, 18th and 19th July covering: recruiting volunteers, keeping them on board and making sure it’s all legal too.

Sign up here

If you’re not sure what an interactive online workshop might look like, Rebecca will be able to explain after the funding workshop face-to-face!  The beginning of the online sessions will also include an orientation.

h.Energy 2018 – making it happen!

Community, Events, Funding, HGN Events One comment

Many of you out there have been involved with h.Energy over the past 8 years since it started in 2010. This countywide festival of sustainability couldn’t have happened without you. You have opened your homes & farms, put on community events, offered us ideas, creativity, expertise, time, music and flapjacks …

This year for the first time ever we are asking you for money.

We aim to fund h.Energy 2018 properly, and take it back out to the whole community of Herefordshire. And we need your help with this.

We already have some funding to support the event, but we are currently urgently seeking local sponsors & supporters. Your support may feel like small change to you but it will be enormously helpful to us…

Here is the link to our Crowdfunder site: ‘h.Energy 2018 – help make it happen’. 

Any level of funding is welcome. If everyone gave a very small amount we would raise a very large amount of money.

If you happen to be in a position to mention this opportunity to friends who might be local sponsors that would also make us very happy! Please ask them to contact kate@hgnetwork.org for further details.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

… & heres that all important link again …

 

 

Food Rescue – what next..

Food, Funding, HGN news Leave a comment

This is a call out to those of you who came along to our HGN Gathering on Food Rescue in January…

Along with the Herefordshire Food Poverty Alliance we are starting an exciting conversation about developing some funded local projects. Many of you had projects that you were beginning to set up or talked about that evening: a local community fridge, a local food hub, food social clubs, school holiday food clubs, local gleaning projects and also of course a local Food Rescue inspired by the work of Worcester Food Rescue.

If you have bright ideas and local connections or would just like to be part of taking these conversions further please could you get in touch asap (email kate@hgnetwork.org), so that we can make sure that your project idea is firmly in the pot as funding bids are developed.

Please pass this message on to others who you think might otherwise miss it…

Dean Organic Fund …

Food, Funding, Land Use, Permaculture Leave a comment

… for small-scale organic/ecological growers and food businesses:

The Organic Research Centre, a leading independent research charity, has launched the new Dean Organic Fund at the Oxford Real Farming Conference. The fund offers interest-free loans, typically ranging from £5,000 to £25,000, to small-scale organic/ecological growers and food businesses.

The Dean Organic Trust was established in 1993 by Jennie Bone and following her death in 2016, the Dean Organic Trust’s assets and a legacy from Jennie Bone’s estate were transferred to the Organic Research Centre to create a significantly larger Dean Organic Fund.

Professor Nic Lampkin, from the Organic Research Centre, said, “The Dean Organic Fund is a rare opportunity for small-scale organic and similar operations to access interest-free loans. Jennie Bone was passionate about conserving wildlife in the farmed environment and she widely encouraged and promoted the environmental benefits of organic farming and growing. We are delighted to continue Jennie’s fantastic legacy and will look forward to receiving applications from eligible businesses.”

The Organic Research Centre is inviting applications for interest-free, unsecured loans from organic farmers and food producers who wish to expand their enterprises by investing in equipment or stock or would benefit from other working capital. The fund is also open to those producers that are not certified organic but whose operations are closely aligned with organic principles. The loans are repayable over periods of up to five years and applications are welcome from companies, sole traders, community or social enterprises and charity-owned businesses.

Further details and application packs are available through the Organic Research Centre’s website: www.organicresearchcentre.com or by email to Nic Lampkin on nic.l@organicresearchcentre.com.

Grow Wild Spaces Grants

Funding, Land Use, Local Groups Leave a comment

Grow Wild which aims to transform communal spaces by sowing and growing UK native plants has announced that local voluntary, community, parish and town councils, youth groups, health authorities , health boards, prisons and secondary schools; etc. can apply for grants of between £2,000 and £4,000 to create a “Grow Wild Community Site.

Grow Wild projects can include an unloved area that organisations want to reclaim for their local community or perhaps somewhere that’s a bit neglected or run-down and applicants want to turn it into an inspiring space for everyone.

Projects should work with one or more of the following groups; young people aged 12-18; Students and young people aged 18-25; people living in urban areas; people experiencing disadvantage and reduced access to services; adults that are less engaged with their community and environmental activities.

The closing date for applications is midday on the 15th January 2018.

 

More information here: www.growwilduk.com

1 2