How did Big Local resident-led groups run small grant schemes?

In most areas, part of the Big Local funding was used for small grants for local voluntary and community groups at some point during the programme. This article will explore why small grant schemes were popular among partnerships and what they looked like in practice.

In Big Local, small grants typically provided money to groups operating at the grassroots level, often with limited experience in formal fundraising, these groups may have struggled to apply to more traditional funding schemes. Aligning with the resident-led principles of the Big Local programme, decisions on grant recipients were made by the resident-led partnerships, who sometimes included residents from the wider community.

Small grants were an effective way of improving social infrastructure (spaces for people to meet, engage, and build relationships in a community) and service delivery by stimulating community activity and engaging the wider community to lead Big Local activities (Davis et al., 2022). Funded activities ranged from community choirs to improving community hubs. The most effective grant schemes responded to community needs, balanced support for existing and new ideas, and inspired excitement about Big Local activity (Davis et al., 2022).

Most partnerships distributed small grants, at least in part, due to encouragement from Local Trust. Aligning with the resident-led principles of the programme, decisions on who to fund were made by the resident-led partnerships, who sometimes devolved this decision-making to residents from the wider community through participatory approaches. During the first few years of Big Local, a large proportion of partnerships established ​‘quick wins’ projects. Small grants were often the tool to fund activities, events, or asset improvements to kickstart Big Local activity. The average grant size was around £1,000 (Local Trust, 2022), but ranged from £250 (often to individuals, for things like travel to job interviews or hosting workshops) to five-figure sums (for larger projects, like asset improvements).

This article is based on Local Trust’s initial scoping research, the Institute for Voluntary Action Research (IVAR) small grants research, and analysis of a sample of 20 areas. These areas were selected to reflect a diversity of approaches, where information was most readily available. Analysis focused on drawing out what helped and hindered small grant processes in Big Local.

In many Big Local areas, small grant schemes were a cornerstone of delivery and became a strategic method for distributing funding throughout Big Local. Initially established as quick wins, small grants enabled partnerships to get started quickly, by funding local voluntary and community sector (VCS) groups and residents. This helped partnerships connect with others to identify and understand local needs. Projects that received small grants often illustrated what groups and individuals felt was needed locally and provided solutions to address those needs. Small grant schemes also enabled partnership members to exercise their decision-making power and familiarise themselves with decision-making processes. Beyond this, small grants helped raise awareness of Big Local in communities.

While form and structure varied across the sample, the most effective small grant schemes were those that kept processes simple and proportionate to the size of the grant. Application forms with a single question, clear criteria, and low administrative burden helped widen participation. More traditional, time-consuming application processes weren’t proportionate to the scale of funding and didn’t encourage community engagement.

In Three Parishes Big Local, the partnership reflected that adopting formal application processes used in other settings – including a long application form and previous match-funding requirements – was off-putting for applicants.

Big Local partnerships involved with the Institute for Voluntary Action Research’s (IVAR) community grants research requested support to streamline their application forms to make their processes easier for applicants. IVAR training helped partnerships to reduce questions, use plain language, diversify accepted application formats (like video), and develop confidence in overseeing applications and decision-making (Davis et al., 2022).

However, where monitoring and reporting from grant recipients was not embedded into the process, partnerships were less able to understand community impact. Partnerships and grantees typically gathered output rather than outcomes data around numbers attending sessions or events, which then may have been aggregated during plan reviews. This made it difficult to evidence achievements to the community and other stakeholders (Local Trust, 2022). Partnership decisions around how much they would ask their grantees to report may have been influenced by Local Trust’s non-prescriptive and light-touch approach to reporting. Reducing administrative and bureaucratic processes helped to remove barriers to participation in Big Local, but also limited the evidence of impact.

Local Trust has explored how in-area evaluation was approached in Big Local in another article.

The most common way partnerships made decisions was collectively, either during partnership meetings or through dedicated sub-groups. Some partnerships maintained this throughout the Big Local programme, sometimes using tools to support collective decision-making, such as scoring systems. Other partnerships adapted their approach over time to include the wider community, using participatory approaches like events where residents could vote on which projects to fund.

Most partnerships distributed small grants aligned to the priorities in their Big Local plans. This thematic approach to funding helped partnerships make funding decisions and provided applicants with a helpful framework for tailoring their application. For example, Rastrick’s partnership decided on themes for their participatory budgeting event – Voice Your Choice – for applicants to base their projects on. Over three events, they prioritised health and wellbeing, environment, and young people.

Of the areas sampled, most had a small grant scheme and large grant scheme, though some had three pots to target specific needs or as a tiered approach to the size of grants. Tiered funding pots provided opportunities for groups to build capacity, take risks, and receive greater amounts over time. Where tiers were less productive, the administrative burden was not proportional to the funding amount, with complex processes or confusing communication.

Tiers reflected the need for diverse funding streams at the community level and enabled partnerships to respond to different needs. For instance, a ​‘tea and toast’ social group may need small but regular amounts to sustain community activity, while a larger capital project may need a one-off five-figure grant.

The Aberfeldy Big Local partnership established two funding tiers. One was specifically for individuals who could apply for up to £1,000 for activities like arts, dancing, yoga, and bike maintenance workshops. A larger discretionary pot was available to organisations applying for over £1,000 to cover costs for larger projects like youth programmes and football clubs.

Less common than collective partnership decision-making structures were participatory events, organised by several partnerships to include residents beyond the partnership in decision-making. In the study sample, the most common participatory events were ​‘soup events’, where residents were encouraged to attend a ticketed public event to listen to applicants’ pitches, enjoy a meal, and vote on which projects should be funded.

East Cleveland Good Neighbours – which covered 11 villages – adopted soup events later in the Big Local programme, as they wanted their approach to distributing funds to be more transparent. They saw soup events as a way to devolve decision-making to residents and connect different groups across the villages.

Other approaches included events in Radstock and Westfield where residents pitched to a panel of judges, and an online voting system in Rastrick to compliment in-person ballots for residents to vote on their favourite projects.

Participatory approaches helped devolve decision-making to a wider group of residents and raise the local profile of Big Local, and providing food helped to encourage attendance.

Partnership capacity was a key enabler to engaging the wider community in small grant schemes. Where this was present, they were able to encourage individuals and groups to apply, promote small grants, and support groups to reapply if unsuccessful or source funding elsewhere.

Having a dedicated paid worker was one of the strongest enablers to a successful grant scheme. Workers performed multiple roles, and for some areas this included small grant scheme support. They helped applicants navigate the application process, offered post-award coaching or training (like how to raise external funds), helped to foster community connections, and facilitated networking among local groups.

Local Trust has explored the role of Big Local workers in another article.

Public events enabled wider community participation in deciding how Big Local funds were spent. However, these approaches were more time and resource intensive, requiring greater capacity both to organise and generate resident engagement. Partnership capacity and paid worker support were key enablers for successful public events. The success of events also relied on community buy-in, both for applicants to pitch and for residents to vote on proposals.

Where community interest waned, partnerships often discontinued their participatory approaches and returned to partnership-based decision making. Support that was intentional and continuous for grant recipients – such as guidance during applications, capacity building, and post-award support – helped sustain activities and services beyond the initial grant.

The Rastrick Big Local partnership oversaw three grant funding schemes targeting specific community needs. This included a smaller Cash4Change pot for groups or individuals to test new projects; Voice Your Choice participatory budgeting events; and the Big Impact Fund for larger projects. The partnership dedicated time and resources to increase engagement across each scheme throughout the application process and post-award. This included reflecting and simplifying application processes over time, supporting applicants to develop their applications, and dedicating worker time to coach groups to access external funding. The partnership reflected that the experience, skills, and knowledge residents gained through applying for funding was as important as the funded projects. The partnership also reflected that their local knowledge from volunteering in existing groups gave them insight into local gaps and opportunities, which influenced how they designed their small grant scheme to target specific needs.

In half of the sampled areas, partnerships adapted their small grants process in some way over the 10 to 15 year span of their Big Local programme. The Big Local model provided time and flexibility for partnerships to modify their approaches along the way and respond to changing external pressure.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Big Local funding was reallocated in many areas to create emergency response pots to target specific needs. The pandemic also prompted partnerships to simplify their grant application processes to ensure funds were distributed quickly. Grants helped provide financial relief to residents and support local groups to deliver essential services, like food provision. These grant funds enabled existing organisations to both survive the financial pressures of lockdown and provide vital services and support to those in need in the community (Local Trust, 2022).

Partnerships in several areas also adapted their process in response to changing community needs, including (but not limited to) the ongoing cost of living crisis. Others created legacy funds later in the programme, focusing on how small grants could help sustain spaces and activities after Big Local.

Local Trust has explored how partnerships responded to the Covid-19 pandemic and cost of living crisis in other articles.

Partnerships that adapted their small grant schemes helped to strengthen community responsiveness to changing needs and external pressures. These adaptations represent how, over time, the partnerships developed the skills and confidence to understand and address changing or urgent community needs.

For many Big Local partnerships, relationships with local groups and public agencies helped to avoid duplication of activities and services and helped them to develop their understanding of local need.

In North West Ipswich, the partnership established a panel of representatives (including local agencies) to provide information to the small grants voting panel, by sharing insights into local community needs and existing service provision. The partnership reflected that working together in this way helped them understand the wider landscape of local provision and helped avoid duplicating services.

Though only a minority of partnerships across the sample included match-funding in their small grant applications, by working collaboratively and embedding it into their criteria, match funding was an effective way to generate additional income for the community. For example, North West Ipswich included match funding as a requirement (grants over £5,000 required at least 5 per cent match funding). Embedding match funding into their policy generated an additional £289,000 for the community. Further, where partnerships supported grantees to access additional funding or resources, this helped create projects that could sustain themselves beyond the Big Local programme.

Small grants were a quick and strategic tool to raise the profile of Big Local, stimulate community activity, and respond to local need and opportunity. A central theme throughout this article was the importance of time. From the amount of time that went into supporting residents and local groups to develop their own ideas, to the time it took to adapt processes and nurture the skills and confidence to understand and respond to community needs. Time gave space for residents to build trust and capacity in their community and create lasting relationships with local groups and individuals.

The long-term and flexible nature of Big Local enabled partnership members, residents, and local groups to take risks, try out new ideas, kickstart projects that may not have otherwise happened, or sustain existing activities and spaces. It also enabled partnerships to adapt their process over time, as they developed their skills and confidence in recognising and responding to community need. While the sums of money were often small, they helped create and sustain community-led activities.

Simple application processes and the availability of either voluntary or paid roles to provide support to grantees during the application process and post-award were crucial to the success of small grant schemes. Future schemes should reflect on reporting needs from the outset.