Rochdale Borough Council

We offer a number of grants for profit, voluntary and community organisations throughout the year.

Rochdale Safer Communities Partnership Voluntary and Community Grant Scheme 2019-2020

Find all the information and criteria, as well as hints and tips, for applying for Rochdale Safer Communities Partnership Voluntary and Community Grant Scheme 2019-2020.

We're inviting applications from local groups from the voluntary, not for profit and charitable sector to distribute funding to local groups. The grants have been devolved to the council for the 2019/20 financial year by the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA).

On this page:

• Purpose of the scheme
• Fund criteria
• Applications
• Decision making
• Funding
• Monitoring and evaluation
• Hints and tips
• Data protection
• Safeguarding

Purpose of the scheme

The purpose of the voluntary and community grant fund is to support consituted local voluntary, community sector or non-for-profit organisations. This is to deliver effective approaches to preventing and tackling crime and antisocial behaviour in Rochdale borough.

Fund criteria

• Your application to the fund must demonstrate how your proposal contributes towards the Rochdale Safer Communities Partnership's priorities that focus on supporting communities so that they are:
  • Free from the harm of domestic abuse and violence
  • Free from the harm of organised crime and exploitation
  • Safe from crime and anti-social behaviour
  • Able to live, work, learn and socialise in harmony in their communities
• In addition to these priorities, we believe victims should be at the heart of what we do. We welcome any bids that are victim-focused and support the Rochdale Safer Communities Partnership to provide victims with additional support beyond the services they're entitled to under the Ministry of Justice’s Code of Practice for Victims of Crime. 
• Projects shouldn't duplicate or compete with existing activity and funding won't be allocated for projects that are unable to demonstrate effective impact upon local priorities.
• There's no requirement for applications to generate match-funding. However, evidence of match-funding is likely to improve the likelihood of the bid being recommended as this demonstrates support for the project and improves value for money for our investment.
• We'll seek to establish local need and support for individual initiatives so you're invited to consider working in partnership with other voluntary organisations as this offers us reassurance that your project has a good level of accountability and is, therefore, more likely to be delivered successfully.
• Applications must be submitted by a registered charity, or a constituted voluntary, community sector or not-for profit organisation.
• With this funding we'll only accept revenue and activity costs and be unable to consider any capital costs associated with the project. Staff costs may be considered if they related to the proposed project and are additional to existing core staff costs of the organisations. 

Applications - how to apply for funding

1. You cannot use funding for more than one specified project and we'll only accept one application per organisation.
2. We aim to make a decision and respond to applicants within 1 month of the closing date for funding applications. 
3. Closing date for applications: 11.59pm on Monday, 8 July 2019.
4. Please return completed applications to: community.safety@rochdale.gov.uk

Decision making

Decisions will be made using available evidence that demonstrates the initiative’s likely impact on the priorities above. We use a panel of partnership officers from the Police, council and voluntary sector to ensure proposed activity reflects local priorities, links-in with existing commissioned or grant-funded activity and provides us with value for money. 

We aim to ensure a fair and impartial distribution of funding across Rochdale borough and the various diverse equality groups that are represented within the area, and between the priorities within the Greater Manchester Police and Crime Plan.

Decisions made will also try to ensure fair proportionate distribution of funding across Rochdale borough and between the priorities within the Police and Crime Plan.

Funding

The total allocation for the 2019-2020 Community Grant fund is £100,000.

Funding will be released upon receipt of a signed funding agreement and transferred through BACS. 

In appropriate cases, an interim payment will be made upon receipt of the signed funding agreement with a final payment following receipt of the interim project report. Payments will be transferred through BACS

Unless otherwise stated within the funding agreement, grants must be spent by March 2020. They cannot be used during the funding period by the applicant to support different projects they may be delivering which haven’t been mentioned in the project application.

Monitoring and evaluation 

Those who are awarded grants are required to provide an interim report by end of October 2019 and a final report by March 2020, using a report template. Performance information will need to demonstrate impact articulated in the application. Financial information presented will need to demonstrate the funding has been spent on the agreed initiatives within the funding application.

We may ask for progress updates at any time, especially for those projects considered to be innovative and have wider potential application.

Successful recipients are expected and encouraged to undertake proactive publicity to demonstrate the positive impact that their initiatives have had on the council’s priorities. This may be in the form of videos, news releases or social media activity. 

Hints and tips

Our other tips include:

• The detail you provide within the application form should be proportionate to the amount of funding requested
• Where appropriate, endorsements from local stakeholders may improve the likelihood of your application succeeding – we may consult other local stakeholders when considering applications for funding
• Questions about the fund should be emailed to community.safety@rochdale.gov.uk 

Data protection

You must comply with the Data Protection Act 1998 and the General Data Protection Regulation. 

You must submit your information in an application form including full details of your proposal including costs and benefits. Any personal information you provide in the application is shared with the evaluating panel and used only for the purpose of reviewing the grant application and the ongoing administration and management of any grants that are awarded. 

We may publicise projects on social media, our website and to other members of the public through news releases. You'll consent to the sharing of your name, contact details and a short description of your proposal with the 3rd party by ticking the consent box on the application form.

Your payment details will be shared with the Greater Manchester Combined Authority for the sole purpose of processing the funding payment.

All our decisions, including grant awards, are published on our website. Information disclosed on the website will include organisation name, short description of project and value of award. 

You've the right to remove consent at any time and to ask that information about you is removed from our systems. There are occasions where we may need to retain sufficient information, for example to evidence funding that's been distributed, but we'll ensure we comply we data protection legal requirements.

Safeguarding

If your project is likely to include children or vulnerable adults, you're expected to have robust safeguarding policies to protect those groups, according to legislations. You'll also need to demonstrate you've a safeguarding policy in place.