The Councillor Community Grants scheme enables councillors to provide grants to a wide variety of constituted community and voluntary, not-for-profit organisations for projects that further the Council’s aims and actively support the Tamworth community to enjoy a better quality of life.
The total amount of funding is £30,000 per year. Each ward Councillor is allocated a budget of £1000 which can be used to support projects that bring benefits to their ward, therefore a maximum of £3000 will be available to spend in each of the ten wards in the borough, i.e., Amington, Belgrave, Bolehall, Castle, Glascote, Mercian, Spital, Stonydelph, Trinity and Wilnecote.
Grants will be awarded for projects/activities that can meet at least one of the following criteria:
- Assists with Cost-of-Living challenges
- Helps tackle the causes of inequality in our communities
- Reduces social isolation
- Helps develop and safeguard our environment and open spaces
- Increases opportunities to participate in arts, heritage, and sports activities
- Increases volunteering and civic pride
- Helps tackle causes and effects of poverty and financial hardship
- Promotes and develops community cohesion
- Provides social support over the festive period
All grants should continue to demonstrate value for money and value to the people of Tamworth and have specific outcomes that can be recorded.
The Grant
- The minimum you can apply for is £250 from each councillor, the maximum you can apply for is £1000 from each councillor.
- Applicants can apply to more than one councillor in a ward or to councillors in other wards if the project supports communities in more than one ward. However, the maximum award per project will be £3000.
- An organisation can submit more than one application in a financial year, but the application must not relate to the same project/scheme previously funded.
- If the total project cost is more than you are applying for, please provide details of other sources of income, including grants, fundraising and membership subs etc, that will be used to cover the full project cost.
- Once we have received your signed agreement, we will prepare to make payment. Grants are paid by BACS, into the bank account you specified at the time of application. Our payment date is at the end of each month with our pay run cut off being the third week. Signed agreements returned after the third week will be paid the following month. Please bear this in mind when applying for a grant.
Eligible Costs
Examples of eligible projects include:
- General running costs (excluding salaries but project specific sessional worker costs can be funded).
- Provision of equipment e.g., IT equipment, craft materials, furniture.
- Funding towards costs of community events/activities
- Funding towards specific projects – e.g., school holiday youth project, playscheme, coffee morning, gardening group projects.
- Small capital projects will only be considered if they can demonstrate wider-community benefit and need e.g. increase uptake of services, activities, and venue hire by the general public, charities, voluntary and community organisations and other support agencies.
Please ensure that prior to submitting an application that you have sought any specific relevant permissions that your project requires e.g., planning permission, landlord consent, landowner consent, for projects/activities taking place on their land, or for modifications to public spaces or facilities.
All Councillor Community Grant applications must be approved by the relevant ward councillor(s) prior to submitting the application for consideration. Organisations can only apply for a maximum of £3000 per project.
Grant allocations will be decided by the Portfolio Holder for Environmental Health and Community Partnerships and the Assistant Director Partnerships in consultation with Assistant Director Environment, Culture and Wellbeing, and their decision is final.
Applications for the Councillor Community Grants Scheme will close once all funding has been allocated on a first come basis.
- Organisations should first contact their local Councillor to discuss their project BEFORE submitting an application. Councillors should use this opportunity to ask questions and decide whether they would consider an application from the organisation.
How to Apply
To apply for a grant up to the maximum value of £1,000 please speak to your councillor. You can then apply using our online application facility. You can attach your supporting documents to the application. More information can be found online here, plus the link to apply
