What could be achieved if there was a long-term unrestricted fund for community-based organisations in Edinburgh?
The City of Edinburgh has two ambitious goals to be achieved by 2030: Ending Poverty and delivering a net zero climate ready City. As we have seen during the pandemic the community-embedded voluntary sector has an important role to play in contributing towards and leading positive change. Much of this was possible because as a sector we know our communities well AND funding structures were relaxed with money distributed both expediently and with trust.
Long-term thinking requires long-term resource, but our sector struggles to think and act long-term due to the dominance of short-term and restricted funding.
The point of the Regenerative Futures Fund development year is to co-design a new ten-year fund for community-based organisations or groups. The starting point for this co-design is a set of principles which currently includes:
- Funding decisions are made by people with experience of the issues the organisations aim to alleviate
- Funding is unrestricted with outcomes defined by the organisation (they are best placed to know what’s needed and what will work best)
- Regenerative approach towards Ending Poverty and Net Zero in Edinburgh
Key partners in this project are: City of Edinburgh Council, Corra Foundation, National Lottery Community Fund, The Robertson Trust, Turn2Us & Edinburgh Trust, William Grant Foundation
