Festive Fun - buy the teeshirt, bust a barrier & be there...

In case the festive season is overwhelming and you feel that you really must get back out into the Big Society, here are a few ideas to keep you occupied without even lifting your fingers from the keyboard:

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So the government wants to empower communities, how do we make that happen?

The government's 'essential guide' to today's Localism and Decentralisation Bill sets out six steps to moving from Big Government to Big Society. The second step is: 'Empower communities to do things their way – by creating rights for people to get involved with, and direct the development of, their communities.'

What do you think needs to happen to make this community empowerment a reality? We will send on a summary of comments to decision makers in the South West and central government.

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Keeping Empowerment Working Event

A date for your diary - full details to be circulated soon

Keeping Empowerment Working - making the case for empowerment
Southville Centre, Bristol on Thursday, 10th February 2011.

A one day learning and networking event for people involved with the Empowerment Good Practice Programme, Targeted Support for Empowerment and Participation Improvement (TSEPI) projects and Empowering Communities partners.

Focusing on:

• How to evidence the links between empowerment, wellbeing and economic recovery.
• Tools and confidence to stay motivated and to motivate others in times of change.

There will be keynote speakers, a variety of workshops to choose from and plenty of opportunity to network and share. Places will be limited so please put the date in your diary now and look out for further information coming soon!

To register your interest in the event please email Liza@zebra.coop.
Zebra Collective

REWARDING Excellence!

The recent REWARDS Ceremony organised by Creating Excellence was both inspiring and a timely reminder of what works – and what matters - in regeneration. The REWARDS recognise and celebrate innovative approaches to regeneration, urban design, sustainable development, quality of place, community cohesion or community empowerment.

A total of seven projects were shortlisted from 14 nominees, with two winners and five Commendations for Exemplary Practice. All seven demonstrate a fundamental principle of successful regeneration projects which can perhaps be best summed up as "Nothing About Us Without Us!" Whether nominees are the recipients of major funds or run on belief, enterprise and enthusiasm, all hold one thing in common: local people at the heart of decisions and delivery.

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Skills Framework for Community Leaders

Councillors in South Gloucestershire will meet on 14th December to finalise a Community Leadership skills framework. The sub group of elected members, all of whom are active community leaders developed the framework during two workshops facilitated by the Zebra Collective as part of the Empowering Good Practice Programme. The draft framework headings include: Effective personal organisation; Excellent communication skills; High aspirational values; Local knowledge - know and understand your community; Understanding the system and unlocking it for others and Inspirational leadership. For more information contact michelle@zebra.coop or watch this blog.

West Howe Community Enterprises

West Howe Community Enterprises was set up by residents in West Howe, Bournemouth to improve communications about the area and make it a better place to live. There's an active group of volunteers who've set up a charity shop called Inspiring Change, amongst many other things. The Empowerment Good Practice programme is enabling the Zebra Collective to work with the group to help them develop and achieve their plans. Last week I facilitated a workshop which enabled the group to clearly define how they will work together as a team. They knew they'd got it right when one participant pointed out that "..if everyone in the world did this, there'd be no more problems!".

Big Society: figleaf for cuts or opportunity for empowerment?

I found myself in a sunny, but chilly Bristol yesterday (Thursday 25 November) along with my colleagues from CDX (Community Development Exchange) Nick Beddow, Emma Lees & Tan Rauf, running the last of our regional events, called "Big Society: figleaf for cuts or opportunity for empowerment?".

Attendees at the CDX event in Bristol, 25 Nov 2010

The event took place at the Pavilion meeting rooms which, whilst a bit tricky to find, was a great venue and the location, right next to the river, was fabulous - especially on a sunny Autumnal day like yesterday. We welcomed delegates from a variety of backgrounds: from local groups, universities, local councils etc, so discussions promised to be interesting from the off.

Emma Lees, CDX’s Development Officer – Policy, kicked things off by giving an update on the current political landscape, explaining some of the thinking behind the Big Society and some of the policies already in place, followed by Nick Beddow, CDX CEO, giving his insight and hosting storytime: Gloomins style – which is a method he has used to raise concerns around Big Society & community organising using a lighthearted children’s-type story. This is where the day got really interesting, as next up on the agenda was Discussion time – firstly identifying threats, then the opportunities, offered by the Big Society.

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Evaluating Empowerment

As the evaluators of the South West Empowering Communities Programme for 2010-11, we would like to use the blog to introduce ourselves. We have been commissioned to carry out an evaluation which will answer the following questions:

• What has been the impact of Empowering Communities - on communities themselves, on public authorities and on the interaction between them?
• What has been learned about empowerment?
• What might be done in the future to maximise impact?

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Government ‘upside down’. What does it mean for empowerment?

The department that funds the regional empowerment partnerships is being ‘turned upside-down’, according to a Deputy Director at the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) who came to speak to our national meeting last week. So are its staff, by the sound of it, 40% of whom will be going in a restructuring which will end in 2012.

The restructuring will leave DCLG (note: no more CLG – the ‘D’ is back) with two policy directorates, Neighbourhoods, which will deal with housing and related issues, and Localism, into which responsibility for ‘enabling Big Society’ will fall. That Big Society work will concentrate on three areas: community rights, race equality and integration, and evidence - ‘informing Big Society’.

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Community Sector's Views on The Big Society: Write up of Community Development Picnic now available

South West Foundation have now posted the write up of the Big Community Development Picnic on their website. This can be downloaded from the Foundation's home page: www.southwestfoundation.org.uk
The write up reflects the views of 120 people who attended events in Shipham in Somerset and at the excellent new meetings room at Disability Cornwall in Hayle.

Big Society Video Presentations Now Online

You can now view video recordings of the presentations featured at the Big Society Conference held on 4 November 2010 at Somerset Cricket Ground, Taunton. The Conference explored what ‘Big Society’ is, what it means for public authorities and community groups in the South West, and what we should be doing about it and featured a number of guest speakers from projects that are empowering people to have a say in decisions that affect them.

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New Empowerment Case Studies Published

Four new case studies have recently been published to the Creating Excellence website, each highlighting how empowerment can work at a local level for different communities across the south west region.

• Neighbourhood meetings improve dialogue between police and the community in Gloucestershire and equip local residents with chairing skills
  Find out more about Fijian born Osea Mala Mala Nitabua, a retired schoolteacher living in St Pauls, Cheltenham who now chairs his local Neighbourhood Coordination Group meetings - thanks to a successful project funded by the Targeted Support for Empowerment and Participation Improvement Programme. This project is part of a Gloucestershire County Council initiative to work with the police and voluntary and community organisations to help empower local residents, particularly from hard to reach groups, through these neighbourhood meetings. The meetings, set up by Gloucestershire Constabulary as part of their neighbourhood policing agenda, provide a forum for the police to liaise with the council and the communities they serve.
  

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Empowerment Good Practice Programme

I've just written up a report on the Group Facilitation Methods course we delivered for South Gloucester Safer and Stronger team, as part of the Empowering Communities Empowerment Good Practice programme for local authorities. The course covered two core facilitation methods which address the challenge of enabling everyone to participate fully whilst managing all contributions, so that everyone is heard. More here.

Live blog from the Big Society conference

This is a ‘live blog’ from today’s Big Society conference. Presentation and case studies from the day have been added to the Creating Excellence website here, with videos and more still to come . . .
 

Nearly 200 people gathered today for the Big Society Conference in Somerset Cricket Ground for discussions about what ‘Big Society’ is, what it means for public authorities and community groups in the South West, and what we should be doing about it. The diverse group of attendees including local councillors, council officers and voluntary organisations staff and volunteers were the lucky ones as the event was heavily oversubscribed, with two people interested in every place available.

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The Big Society Conference

On Thursday 200 people will gather in Taunton to discuss how to make Big Society work in the South West. We are using this website to provide a space for discussion from delegates at the conference and those unable to attend to take the conversation forward about what needs to happen to ensure people are genuinely empowered and collectively we can tackle social problems affecting us.

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It pays to invest in community development!

It’s so sad to see cuts like those at Pengegon (see previous post) in prospect when ‘the voluntary and community sector sits at the heart of the Government’s ambitions to create a Big Society’ – Building a Stronger Civil Society. And when good evidence is emerging that empowerment pays.

A new report from the New Economics Foundation for the Community Development Foundation demonstrates that for every £1 a local authority invests in community development, £15 of value is created.

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Cornish empowerment project under threat

Effective community empowerment on the deprived Pengegon estate in West Cornwall has been featured in the Guardian because it is at risk of serious cuts next March. Clare Arymar, Pengegon's neighbouhood manager, is widely recognised on the estate as the 'glue' that has made the estate more secure and happy. She helped set up the residents' association, runs events to bring people together and create a sense of community, and has an open-door policy for residents to drop in for support or advice in her estate-based office. Her project costs just £38,000 a year but is under threat because like all local authorities, Cornwall Council is being asked to cut its budget by more than a quarter over four years.

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New health empowerment guide features three South West projects

A new guide to community empowerment in health has just been published by CDF. It advocates community empowerment as a way to improve both efficiency of health services and directly improve individuals' physical and mental health as they become more active and empowered in their communities. It gives guidance to anyone who works with the public in the health sectoron how to make empowerment work and what some of the common challenges may be.

The report also presents case studies of successful community empowerment in health, including three projects in the South West:

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Participatory Budgeting

It was good to see the Communities and Local Government website give a plug to participatory budgeting last week – you can read it here:

www.communities.gov.uk/communities/bigsociety/participatorybudgeting/

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Danger of short-termism in community empowerment

Wiltshire is launching four new local voluntary sector forums, and I attended the launch of the first of these last week to share with them my understanding of Big Society and what it might mean for voluntary organisations. I had an interesting chat afterwards with an experienced community empowerment worker.

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Community Organiser discussion in Cornwall

Hayle-based Disability Cornwall hosted a meeting yesterday to give people in the far South West a chance to hear about the Big Society and Community Organisers. No government person was available to deliver the official Community Organiser presentation, so having heard it from the horse’s mouth the day before, I did my best to give it straight. The reaction was much as it had been in Somerset – scepticism, generally speaking. Concerns were voiced about how this approach fits with principles of equality. How well will the quiet voices be taken into account, and young people, for example?

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Empowerment Works in Somerset

Empowerment Works made its debut appearance yesterday at ‘The Big Community Development Picnic’, organised by the South West Foundation, and George (the Funding Advisers Forum) at Shipham Village Hall in Somerset. I made a presentation about the campaign to 80 community development workers and funding advisers, outlining the Big Society agenda, suggesting ways of responding to it and highlighting examples of successful empowerment projects. The event was a great opportunity to introduce the campaign, and feedback was very positive. But the mood is grim. With so many organisations and jobs under threat from cuts, how, people want to know, are they meant to bring the Big Society about? Community development skills are essential, but how do we preserve them in the current climate?

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Welcome To Our Test Site

Welcome to the Empowering Communities Website.
We are developing a programme of work to ensure that there is a lasting legacy from community engagement projects carried out by Empowering Communities, a regional partnership in the South West of England. Lots of training, events and resources have been developed to help communities get their voices heard and to support public authorities to listen and engage with them. For the time being the site is in development, but we'll be using this website to tell you all about this work and how you can learn from it and take it forward, so please return again soon.