We have received a booklet with a huge amount of detail about funding opportunities throughout the country, which is complete with associated contacts.

We have prepared a version that is for clubs in Kent and the metropolitan area and it can be found for download here.

Just in case there is a need for funding in other areas throughout the country, the full document covering the entire country can be found here.

If you apply for funding from any of the organisations and charities that are listed in the document Kent Cricket Board will be very pleased to here about it.

If you need some idea about how to go about fundraising, this company may be of interest to you.

They seem to have several courses that may be appropriate.  Please note KCB is in no way associated with this company - we are merely passing on the information which has been sent to us.

Underneath is a graph which shows cricket way ahead of other sports in getting well over £1.5m in savings around Gift Aid and being a CASC club.

You might like to refer to the ECB KCB Roadshow held during February for more details about how your club might benefit.

You will also probably be interested in the following graph which shows just how Cricket clearly leads the way over the other major sport when it comes to understanding - and taking up - the benefits of Gift Aid and CASC Status:

Also available is the CASC 2011 Spring Newsletter which contains details of the new arrangements for applying to become a Community Amateur Sports Club.

Kent Cricket Board has recently been informed of a Green Fund that clubs and schools could apply for.   It is the EDF Green Fund and this link will give more details.

http://www.edfenergy.com/products-services/for-your-home/our-services/green-energy-fund.shtml

In short it is open to non-profit making bodies who provide a service to the community and it is looking to support up to 50% of costs towards projects that produces heat, electricity or other power. Full details and information on how to apply can be found on the EDF website.

A vital ingredient in your Funding Plan is where you might just get your funding from.  Download and read this Kent Cricket Board document which is full of sound advice about possible sources.

We have been given details of a couple of funding opportunities that Clubs might not be aware of.

The first one is the Inspired Facilities Fund aims at touching local communities across the country with the magic of London 2012 in a tangible way, and this fund will bring National Lottery funding to local groups and facilities that haven’t previously benefited.

Sport England will invest £50 million of National Lottery funding in up to 1,000 local sports facilities.

Clubs, community and voluntary sector groups and councils will be able to apply for grants of between £25,000 and £150,000 where there is a proven local need for a facility to be modernised, extended or modified to open up new sporting opportunities.

Full details are here.

Secondly, £10 million of National Lottery funding will be available to protect and improve playing fields. Playing fields are vital to a vibrant grassroots sports environment, yet some are allowed to fall into a poor state and others are earmarked as future development opportunities.

This programme will secure the future of many sites for a minimum of 25 years. Sport England will invest in improving pitches and bringing disused playing fields back into use, creating a lasting Olympic and Paralympic legacy of high quality pitches where people can play sport right across the country. As part of this, Sport England will work in partnership with Fields in Trust to support their programme, Queen Elizabeth II Fields Challenge.

Applicants can be any sports club, voluntary or community organisations or local authorities.

Sport England will launch the first of five £2 million funding rounds in spring 2011, with the final round in 2014/15.

Full details and other links can be found here

Sport in the community is about local people, local facilities, local groups and organisations working together to provide opportunities to enjoy sport. Betfair and SportsAid recognise the importance of community sport, so Cash 4 Clubs has been set up to facilitate fundraising for community sports clubs throughout the country.

Cash 4 Clubs offers all sports clubs in the UK the chance to win grants ranging from £250 to £1000. It is a simple scheme aimed at giving community clubs a helping hand and provide the opportunity to raise the money they need to invest in their club.

You can find everything you need to know about Cash 4 Clubs on their website.

A very useful booklet has been prepared by NatWest and is aimed at all clubs, especially those who are looking for funding!

It’s the first time this booklet has been produced and ECB/NatWest have plans to update it year-on-year.  Very interesting indeed!

Download a copy from here

How can you add that little bit of sustainability to your project?  Do you need assistance in completing funding bids?

If so, Funding Buddies can offer the help and skills your club needs to be successful in completing bids.

The Funding Buddies project is a programme to assist community and voluntary groups access funding opportunities. It will also develop training courses to increase and enhance the skills of community organisations.

The project will operate throughout the Mid Kent Leader+ area but will concentrate specifically on the Isle of Sheppey and Romney Marsh.

You can visit their website here.

For everyone looking at trying to raise funds for their club project, the Tesco Community Awards Scheme might be of interest.

The Tesco Charity Trust Community Awards Scheme provides one-off donations of between £500 and £4,000. The funding they give goes towards providing practical benefits, such as equipment and resources for projects that directly benefit children, the elderly and adults and children with disabilities, living in the local communities around our stores in the UK.

You can find out more by downloading the attached PDF file or by visiting this link - or both!

Recently, Kent Cricket Board carried out a thorough review of the potential funding streams and opportunities that exist today.

All of our findings have been included in a document which lists the names of the organisations involved, all their contact details and the types and levels of funding that they offer.

It contains details of the Lord’s Taverners, O2’s “Its Your Community” Fund, Kent Sports Development Unit (KSDU), Kent Community Foundation, Comic Relief, Awards for All, Sport England, Sport England Small Grants, Pro-Active London Partnerships, Skills Active Bursaries and of course, the England and Wales Cricket Board.

If you are currently looking for funding this document will be of considerable interest to you.  You can find it by following this link.

As always, Clair Gould and Andy Griffiths, Community Cricket Managers are available to give you advice on any funding opportunity you may want to investigate.

Following a review of the Awards for All England programme, changes are to be made to the small grants scheme’s existing format when it comes to an end in March 2009.

Currently Awards for All England is a joint Lottery grants programme supported by Arts Council England, Big Lottery Fund, Heritage Lottery Fund and Sport England.

From 1 April 2009 each of the lottery distributors supporting the scheme will have their own small grants programmes up and running. Applications can still be made under the current arrangements until 31 March 2009.

The change will mean that each distributor can better address the needs of their applicants and the themes they support. Overall, across all the distributors, it is anticipated that new money available for small grants in 2009-10 will be comparable to money that was available to community groups through Awards for All in 2008-2009.

To ensure this change will be as seamless as possible, the distributors will each run their own small grants programme as follows:

• Big Lottery Fund will launch a new small grants programme on 1 April 2009 awarding grants of £300 to £10,000 to local communities in 2009-2010.

• Sport England will provide small grants for sports ranging from £300 - £10,000 from 1 April 2009.

• Arts Council England will provide small grants through their existing ‘Grants for the arts’ programme, supporting awards between £1,000 and £100,000.

• Heritage Lottery Fund small grants will be provided through the existing ‘Your Heritage’ (£3,000 to £50,000) and ‘Young Roots (£3,000 to £25,000) schemes.

There is also a Question and Answer document which will answer many of the questions you may have and it’s available for download from here.