Tower Hamlets Council Small Grants Fund: Cohesion Events East End Community Foundation

The East End Community Foundation (EECF) is now seeking applications for the Tower Hamlets Council Small Grants Fund: Cohesion Events to support a programme of community events; held indoors, outdoors, or virtually.

The Cohesion Events Fund focuses on community cohesion and re-connecting communities who have been most affected by the pandemic.

Priorities

All events should focus on community cohesion and reconnecting communities to:

• Address issues of loneliness and isolation and to improve the mental health and wellbeing of residents.
• Build relationships between residents to emphasise the commonalities between people. Events should seek to unite people, develop a sense of belonging, bridge social divides and bring otherwise separate communities closer together.
• Emphasise breaking down barriers between residents of different age groups. Inter-generational events should bring older and younger people together to promote engagement between the groups and help tackle the isolation experienced by both groups due to the pandemic.
• Recognise the importance of volunteers, unpaid carers and coordinating bodies as part of the vital work they have done in the last year in supporting the Tower Hamlets community.
• Help to address digital inclusion, bringing people together using technology to host online interactive events between different groups of people. For example, there could be an emphasis on building skills and confidence, with a focus on groups who are traditionally digitally excluded, such as older people, people with sensory impairments or socially excluded people with low incomes. These events could take the form of a virtual coffee gathering, an online arts class, phonics, stories for families, etc.

Funding Information

£45,000 is available to distribute. There are two funding levels available:

• Grants of up to £500 for street party events or small scale events
• Grants of up to £3,000 for larger scale events
• Geographic Spread & Diversity: Tower Hamlets Council aims to achieve a good geographical spread of events taking place across the borough, as well as the diversity of applicant organisation’s leadership team to ensure events and organisations are representative of local demographics. Applications will be prioritised based on achieving this geographic spread. It is important that events encourage all parts of the community in Tower Hamlets to participate.

Eligibility Criteria

• Voluntary and Community Sector organisations as well as Tenants and Residents Associations are encouraged to apply and to incorporate the promotion and engagement of their own services to event attendees.
• This is intended to help establish relationships and to give attendees the chance to engage in community networks and get involved in more community activity in the future.

The fund is open to all voluntary and community organisations. These are defined as:

• Registered charities
• Community groups
• Community associations
• Tenants and residents’ groups
• Green spaces friends’ groups
• Co-operatives and social enterprises
• School/parent groups which are independent of the schools they work with
• Faith organisations
• Sports, environmental, arts and heritage organisations
• Grant making trusts
• Housing associations
• Un-constituted groups of residents working together to make a difference in their local communities

Source:https://eastendcf.org/tower-hamlets-grants/