District Dispatch - 17 October 2023

Every year, we set aside an amount of money to help support environmental projects, community groups, sporting activities and businesses to achieve their goals. So far this year, we have awarded £79,380 across our district through our Grants and Concessions programme.

This money aims to support important projects across the district that will benefit our residents and businesses. Over the last year recipients have included: Westbourne Community Land Trust; Rocking Horse Children's Charity, Chichester; West Wittering Parish Council; Young Wilders, Plaistow; and Home-Start, which is district wide.

If you run a community group or organisation and would like to find out about how the scheme could help you, then please get in touch. We can offer fast track applications for amounts under £1,000 which groups can apply for at any time. For amounts over £1,000, applications will be considered by our Grants and Concessions panel every three months. The grants programme supports three key priorities: the economy; improving places and spaces; and target projects which will benefit residents most in need. Applications need to meet certain conditions and we ask for details of how the project will benefit the local community, for example creating jobs and working with others. You can find out more on the Chichester District Council Grants Programme page.

I'm also pleased to tell you that we will be shortly inviting applications for UK Shared Prosperity Funding. Last year, the council was allocated £1 million to spend on a variety of projects across the district. The funding was awarded to the council to help encourage economic growth and improve the quality of life for people across our area. The money has already started to be spent on a number of projects to improve public areas, including the removal of graffiti, the introduction of new signage and to deliver events.

We will soon be encouraging community groups to apply for the second round of grant funding for community projects and improvements. There is also a pot of money to support businesses. The funding priorities are communities and place; support for local businesses; and people and skills. We also have funding from the Rural England Prosperity Fund, which is to be used to support activities that address the particular challenges faced by rural areas. To find out more about both funds and to apply, please read the .

In other news, I also want to tell you about our webcast facility, which we introduced at the start of the year. This enables you to watch live council meetings from wherever you are, just visit our Chichester District Council view meetings page. You can also watch archived meetings from the last few months and access any documents or presentations associated with the webcasts.

I'm pleased to tell you that between January and August, council meetings were viewed online over 14,000 times. This is part of our commitment to make meetings more accessible to all of our residents and businesses. Please do have a look and remember, you are always welcome to come to East Pallant House to watch public meetings and arrange to ask a question. To find out more about this, please visit our Public Speaking section (opens new window).

Finally, I hope you managed to visit and enjoy our Cross, Market & More event at the weekend. Don't forget, we will be holding another one of these events on Sunday 19 November between 10am and 4pm in North Street and East Street in Chichester. This will offer you a great chance to buy Christmas goods and gifts and support local suppliers. From a huge variety of traders to delicious food and drink, quality entertainers to top class local makers and producers, the event showcases the rich variety that we're lucky to have on our doorstep.

Best Wishes

Cllr Adrian Moss

Leader of Chichester District Council