The Civic Trust want to launch a national campaign to restore wasted green spaces across the country. It is our aim for every community to live within 5 minutes of a well managed and clean green space. Currently over 100 civic societies have told us they are actively engaged in parks and open spaces but perhaps you are as well. Why not tell us your stories here or why not click the link to see who else is involved in this type of campaign.

As a small society we like to think that we have achieved in regard to the local community gardens. However a big problem we face is funding we always go to the same sources i.e. town council and local authority but this is not sustainable for us to ensure we always have money available for enhancements etc. We have tried applying to Awards for All but have never been successful. Does anyone know what other type of funding is available and also if any awards exist for community groups who manage small community gardens. It is a well used resource by the community.

Have you had the chance to read through the criteria for a Community Spaces grant?  On the website (http://www.community-spaces.org.uk/) the first mention on the list of example projects is community gardens and parks. 

The Scheme has only recently been launched and the first applications window has been opened.  The grants panel will be meeting regularly to authorise projects at the first stage.  All community groups that are successful at stage 1 must agree to work with a Facilitator – a Facilitator is a trained individual who is able to provide specialist advice and guidance to groups. Facilitators will be able to help groups develop their Stage 2 application form and may be able to help successful groups to develop and deliver their project.

Worth a try!

We have a project we would like to get funding for but it is not at the £10,000 level. Do you know of anything else? We want to clean up a small green space which is going to waste by all bodies concerned, a clean up job to being with followed by the installation of some lights and a bench etc.

We campaign for the restoration and protection of historic parks and best practice knowledge diffusion. Does any funding exist for campaiging to Save Open Spaces?

The Local Authority in Liverpool has a tendency to give it away Open Spaces see the “Liverpool Football Club moving to Stanley Park Campaign”. Does any funding exist for campaiging to Save Open Spaces? Perhaps other groups have campaigned to stop large organisations such as football clubs attempting to eat up any land they want?

I have been on to the Community Spaces website regarding funding but I have a question directly for the Civic Trust.

Do you intend on running any training courses for Civic Societies on how they can access funding for Open Spaces, whether that be Community Spaces funding or another pot such as Awards for All.

I attended the Paving the Way training sessions last year and they worked tremendously well giving us an opportunity to not only meet other Civic Societies but to learn about exciting initiative’s and ideas that we could be suing in our own Civic Society.

We would certainly welcome training whether on-line or in a classroom based around Green Space Funding

MBackri, The Civic Trust is currently reviewing training options for this year’s Paving-The-Way training series. So suggestions and comments from members on training areas are most welcome. Details about future training will be posted on this website in due course.

To answer your question, we have not planned to include fundraising as part of the training programme as yet, neither can I guarantee whether it would be one of the options on offer. In the meantime, however, we can provide you with a very good guide on how to fundraise for environmental projects which was put together for those taking part in our Every Actions Counts campaign. The Guide, which covers everything from; what make a good environment project bid, to developing the proposal and finding the right funder, can be downloaded from the following link http://www.civicsocieties.org.uk/members/document_library/other/

We also have on this website a few case-studies from Civic Societies that have successfully received funding for community based projects. You may want to look at these by clicking the following link http://www.civicsocieties.org.uk/members/fund-search/