Overview of the first Community Renewal Fund Forum – 5th July 2021
CEDOS hosted its first Community Renewal Fund (CRF) Forum on the 5th July, with a good range of Local Authority representatives from across England and from both rural and urban authorities. Below are some of the key headlines from the discussion.
- The application process had been difficult and the timeframes very short, both for Upper Tier Managing Authorities and for the individual applicants themselves.
- The CRF process, whilst aimed at stimulating innovative projects, had excluded a lot of smaller organisations due to grant thresholds. These applicants were more likely to have developed genuine innovation and more hyper localised pilots over the shorter timeframes.
- Local Authorities were at different stages in preparing for contacting with any projects that are approved, but all ultimately wanted to conclude the process quickly.
- Many rural Authorities that had delivered LEADER programmes were drawing from these processes where possible in contracting, governance and the approach to working with applicants.
- All Authorities felt projects (both external and internal) would need significant support and tight monitoring, compliance and risk management. All Authorities were planning of taking a hands-on approach to fund management.
- All Authorities were looking at procuring/employing additional resources to manage the fund – nobody stated they could manage the likely workloads with existing resources. The management resources were deemed to be necessary and, on reflection, on the light side for the likely requirements of a Managing Authority over the short time period.
- There was some concern that CRF activity, coupled with existing and forthcoming activity (such as Restart contracts and ESF provision) would mean a significant number of organisations chasing the same client group.
- Some Authorities were concerned there was a risk of double counting outputs or double funding provision and Authorities were looking at ways of dealing with this through the contracting process.
- It was difficult at this stage to see how some of projects that had been shortlisted could ultimately inform the UK Shared Prosperity Fund – although some Authorities were using the CRF process to develop and refine their fund management process.
- There was a worry that the capacity being built up in Upper Tier Authorities to manage the Community Renewal Fund would need to be rebuilt as the timeframes for the UK Shared Prosperity Fund and CRF are not contiguous.