Grants and Community News for 19 August 2022

Know Your Neighbourhood Fund: Invitation for Intermediary Grant Makers

The government has launched a Know Your Neighbourhood (KYN) Fund. Up to £14 million will be made available through the KYN Fund for activities enabling volunteering and tackling loneliness in targeted high deprivation local authority areas in England. The objectives of the KYN Fund are, by March 2025:

  • To build the evidence to identify scalable and sustainable place-based interventions that work in increasing regular volunteering and reducing chronic loneliness.
  • To increase the proportion of people in targeted high-deprivation local authorities who volunteer at least once a month.
  • To reduce the proportion of chronically lonely people in targeted high-deprivation local authorities who lack their desired level of social connections.
  • To enable targeted high-deprivation local authorities, and the local voluntary and community sector in these places, to implement sustainable systems and processes that encourage volunteering and tackling loneliness.

Guidance on how to apply to the Intermediary Grant Maker fund can be found on the GOV.UK website.

Connecting You – A Devon County Council Community Fund

Community organisations in Devon can apply for grants of up £10,000 for projects that trial innovative transport solutions to loneliness.

Devon County Council made a successful bid to the Department of Transport’s Tackling Loneliness with Transport fund, and secured just under £494,000 to deliver an innovative transport pilot along with our delivery partners: Devon Communities Together, Westbank Community Health & Care, Devon & Cornwall Rail Partnership and One Northern Devon.

Included within our bid was the proposal to run a Community Grants Fund which allows us to help other local Devon organisations to trial their own innovative transport solutions to loneliness. There is a total budget of £170,000 for the Community Grants Fund.

All projects must take place within Devon and be for the benefit of Devon residents who are within our defined beneficiary groups:

  • Older People aged 55+
  • Young People aged 16 – 24

Geographical “Cold Spot” bids will be prioritised. These are projects where remoteness and rural sparsity make conventional transport services a particular challenge to deliver. We have designated the following areas as travel Cold Spots:

We are asking for your help in reaching people who will benefit from this fund and to help spread the word on this project.

Grants of between £1,000 up to £10,000 will be considered. Grants are for revenue expenditure only.

We are inviting applications from community organisations that are incorporated and subject to the rules of a regulatory body i.e., the Charity Commission or Companies House. Organisations should have been established for at least two years.

You can find the online application form and guidelines for applying on the Devon County Council website.

Community News

Mental Health First Aid Course

Two day, in person course in Barnstaple, hosted by North Devon Volunteer Service (NDVS) - October 2022.

LIMITED SPACES are available to employees, volunteers of voluntary, and community organisations.

Through a blend of instructor-led in person sessions and self-learning activities, this 2 day course offers:

- A deeper understanding of mental health and the factors that can affect people’s wellbeing, including your own.

− Practical skills to spot the triggers and signs of mental health issues.

− Confidence to step in, reassure and support a person in distress.

− Enhanced interpersonal skills such as on-judgemental listening.

− Knowledge to help someone recover their health by guiding.

Learners who complete the course will be certified as Mental Health First Aiders. They will receive a certificate on completion of the course.

DATES: Wednesday 5th & Wednesday 12th October 2022

TIMES: 09.30 to 16.00

LOCATION: NDVS Office, Queens House, Queen Street, Barnstaple, Devon, EX32 8HJ

COST: £30 pp to cover certification and course resources.

The usual cost of this course would be £300 and is being subsidised for voluntary and community groups by NDVS to support voluntary sector re-engagement and COVID recovery.

Any questions, please email Louise via cvs@ndvs.org.uk or phone 01271 866300.

Book your place via Eventbrite.