The Bags of Help grant funds capital projects that provide community benefit that do not charge for access. The community grant scheme will support thousands of community green space projects each year with between £8,000 and £12,000.
Tesco award grants each year in around 400 Tesco regions to make sure the funding is spread evenly across England, Wales and Scotland. In total the Bags of Help programme supports thousands of projects each year.
Because there is major demand for grants, Groundwork assesses all of the applications received and then provides a shortlist of the applications received for a Tesco Shortlisting Group to agree three successful projects to forward to a vote in Tesco stores.
Tesco customers vote over two weekends in their store for their favourite shortlisted local project.
Grants are then awarded as follows:
1st place in Tesco customer vote: £12,000 grant
2nd place in Tesco customer vote: £10,000 grant
3rd place in Tesco customer vote: £8,000 grant
The grants programme is open to organisations such as: voluntary/community organisations, registered charities, health bodies, Parish/Town councils, social enterprises, Community Interest Companies, schools, hospices, community councils, local authorities and housing organisations. Other not-for-profit organisations might also be eligible.
Projects that would typically receive funding include:
• Parks, pocket parks and urban green spaces
• Green corridors – river and canals, cycle ways
• Formal and informal play areas
• Open access sports facilities within public parks and recreation grounds – eg football pitches, tennis courts and cricket pitches
• Informal outdoor recreation facilities; eg gym equipment, trim trails and woodland walks
• Nature reserves, community woodland, ponds and village greens
• Churchyards
• Seafront improvements
• Community allotments, community gardens, orchards and city farms
• Spaces in the grounds of hospices and day centres
• Allotments
• School grounds
• Community spaces on housing estates or residential areas
For further information and to apply, visit: www.groundwork.org.uk/Sites/tescocommunityscheme/pages/large-grants-tes
Deadline: Friday 3 June 2016, 12noon