The auspices were all good as we ‘launched’ £eith Chooses 2019-20. The skies turned orange then purple, and a glorious rainbow settled on Leith.
Credit and thanks to Nick Gardner, Willy Barr,and Dr.Bells Family Centre for their great photos (taken from the window of Leith Community Centre).
Applications are invited for project proposals that address the £eith Chooses 2019-20 theme, which is:
Fighting Hunger and / or Loneliness
Your application can address either Hunger or Loneliness, or both.
You can download Guidance Notes and Applications forms here
Applications are invited as soon as possible, ideally before Christmas, and must be in by 6th January 2020 at the very latest. Please think about coming along to a Support session before submitting your application, to make sure your idea / application is on the right track.
Please would you be good enough to complete this short survey about your experience of £eith Chooses 2019? It should not take you more than about 10 minutes, and will give the organisers important information to help future planning.
Click below to start. Thank you
This short video explains a bit more about how voting will work at this year’s £eith Chooses, and about the new ‘booster vote’.
In the past, small and new, or not widely known groups have very often missed out, at £eith Decides / £eith Chooses. In particular, sadly, this has affected groups whose projects mainly involve ethnic minorities. The key is in the word ‘minority’ – such groups just don’t manage to get the vote numbers. It’s not just a problem in Leith, it’s a weakness of Participatory Budgeting in general. This year, any group that has made special efforts to engage with minority ethnic communities (including language minorities) – as applicants, partners, project workers, participants, beneficiaries etc.could qualify for a ‘booster vote’.
Contact the £eith Chooses team, to find out if / how your project might qualify.
Email – Caroline.Lamond@edinburgh.gov.uk
Why not partner up with another (or more than one) organisation, for your £eith Chooses project bid? This is a great way to work cooperatively, rather than in competition with each other, for funds. A small group without a constitution can be ‘sheltered’ by a bigger group taking responsibility for governance. Groups doing similar things, but maybe with different ‘end users’, can share ideas and resources. And of course, partnering is a good way to widen your voter base!
Launch Night approaches!
Tuesday 20th November 2018
6pm, Leith Community Centre, New Kirkgate (cafe area)
Please do come along and hear about the plans for this year: There are some quite significant changes to the structure and process of £eith Chooses, this year, so you need to know about that before you create your project application.
Catch up with the latest news, have a cup of tea and a wee snack, pick up an Application form, and Guidance Notes, and take the chance to ask questions and discuss ideas.
We are now at the stage of trying to get feedback about the 2018 £eith Chooses event. We want to know what everyone thinks (positive and negative!) and to get ideas about how £eith Chooses can be improved.
Two ‘Survey Monkey’ evaluation questionnaires are now in circulation, to collect views. One was emailed to project applicants and the other is for – well, ‘everybody’ – supporters, voters and the general community.You!
Please take a few minutes to fill in this short survey, via this link
Also – a face to face feedback discussion session, perhaps primarily for applicants but open to all, will be held on Tuesday 15th May (18:30 – 20:30 in the Leith Community Centre Cafe area), to facilitate interaction between participants, identify issues, share suggestions for improvement, and generate new ideas. We really want to know what you think and how £eith Chooses can be improved! (Please let us know if you want to come along – we’d like to know numbers roughly as a finger buffet will be provided.)
We also welcome any feedback you wish to provide by email, directly, to leithchooses@edinburgh.gov.uk
Following in- person card voting on the 3rd March, and online voting from 3-17 March (totalled together), the following projects have been awarded funding through £eith Chooses:
SMALL GRANTS
Leithers Don’t Litter – Good Clean Fun
CLASP Seniors Tea Party
Cleaning Up Restalrig Road
Help Scouts go Camping
Art Outside the Police box
The Big Brunch – towards a shared vision of Childcare
Family Fun Street Games and Dance
See Me Portrait Project
Taobh Na Pairce Film Making Workshop
Choose Happiness
Leith Fort Residents Community Group
MEDIUM GRANTS
Hidden Door Festival – involving the local community
Tailor Ed Foundation
Leith Primary Parent Council – Trim Trail
All Together Charity Shop – Skills Training
Leith Community Cinema – accessible screenings
Invisible Cities – Street Barber project
Mustard Seed – Soul Food Easter Road
Leith Late – A Wall is a Screen
Dr. Bells Family Centre – Summer Programme
St. Mary’s Primary – Bike Shelter & Scooter Rack
Leith FAB Cricket Club – all weather artificial pitch
Beyond Gender – LGBT+ Creative Writing (substantial partial funding)
LARGE GRANTS
Leith DIY Skateparks – extensding skateboarding facilities for all
Leith Theatre Trust – Thomas Morton Hall equipment
The Edinburgh Tool Library – accessible Leith
Creative Electric – art and performance with various groups
Projekt 42 – yoga, youth fitness, summer bootcamp
Citadel Youth Centre – Citadel Connect
Out of the Blue – Meanwhile…in Leith Hub
Scottish Historic Buildings / Leith Heritage Trail Group (small partial funding)
All this adds up to a total of £118,000 that will go to the community in Leith in many and varied ways, through the energy, work and commitment of all the great project teams taking part.
Many thanks to everybody that participated in £eith Chooses in any capacity – applicant teams, supporters, voters, volunteers, organisers, elected representatives, retweeters…
Only fly in the ointment – so gutted that there were, inevitably, some projects that didn’t get funding. There were so many brilliant projects (and such an incredibly diverse range), we just wish that everybody could have got what they needed, and nobody lose out. Sadly not possible, but please don’t be too discouraged. We sincerely hope that you got something out of the experience – publicity? new links, contacts and supporters? new ideas?
We will try and pass on to you any ideas or opportunities for other sources of funding.
You can vote if you are over 8 years old and you live, work, study or volunteer in Leith.
You can only vote once online (whether or not you voted in person). Click the blue text below to link to the voting site.
To vote you need a special Access Code and a Password. Please note that you can no longer obtain an access code by emailing in, as there is no time left to process them before close of voting. Voter Access Code cards are still available from Leith Library (Ferry Road), and MacDonald Road Library (until libraries close at 5 pm on Saturday, or until the cards run out, whichever is the sooner….). You must provide your name and address and postcode to determine whether you are eligible to vote. That information will be held securely for 31 days and then deleted. See more details of Privacy policy / compliance with Data Protection legislation
You get 4 votes in each of the three pots (small, medium, large). You can only vote once for any particular project. You must use all 4 votes, and hit to CONFIRM each or none of them will count. (You can choose VOTE on projects and then unclick those again if you change your mind, as often as you like, but once you’ve clicked CONFIRM, there’s no going back and undoing votes.)
Update
Online Voting was ‘switched off’ at 5 pm on Saturday 17th March.
Applying to the £eith Chooses fund is more of a ‘process’ than one-off act.
Our Help and Support Sessions are running through December and January (with a wee break for Christmas and New Year holidays). These are very informal. Their aim is simply to encourage groups to apply, and to provide whatever support is needed. They are taking place as follows:
Mondays – Leith Library (Ferry Road) 12-2 pm and 5-7pm
Tuesdays – MacDonald Road Library 12-2 pm and 5-7pm
Wednesdays – Community Centre, Newkirkgate 12-2 pm (Persevere Room) and 5-7pm (cafe)
Thursdays – The Hub, Restalrig Road 12-2 pm only
If you start having a conversation in one of these places with a particular person /team, it makes sense to go back to continue the conversation with the same people, in the same place.
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