GreenSpace News |
Green Pennant Awards announced
96 Green Pennant Awards were won by community groups as part of the Green Flag Awards 2009, along with 917 Green Flag winners. The Green Pennant Award is presented to green spaces managed by voluntary and community groups. These parks are judged on similar criteria to the Green Flag Award applicants, with special consideration given to their achievements. This category often presents some of the most unique winners. The Green Flag Award Scheme is run by a consortium of GreenSpace, BTCV and Keep Britain Tidy. More
Record-breaking Love Parks Week
The Love Parks Week team would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who contributed to Love Parks Week 2009 and made it such a great success.
This year's Love Parks Week has been the biggest to date, with over 600 events registered on the website and around 400,000 people estimated to have attended an event during the week.
Local authorities and community groups alike have shown huge support for the campaign, helping GreenSpace to raise awareness of the importance of our parks and green spaces. Last year saw 300 events registered as part of Love Parks Week; this year that total has more than doubled.
Not only is this a great example of the parks sector coming together to provide free family events across the UK that everyone can enjoy during the summer holidays, it also adds significant weight to the campaign’s call for continued investment and support for these valuable assets.
Visit www.loveparksweek.org.uk to find out more about the campaign.
Contribute to the Community Bench
If you have any useful information you think would be of interest to other community groups (perhaps a website, publication or resource you have used) why not send us an email and we'll try to include it in the Community Bench. We are also looking for more Community Profiles, so if your group has done something you'd like to share with others please email community@green-space.org.uk.
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Funding news |
Fiskars Orange Thumb 2010 grant scheme now open for applications
Fiskars Orange Thumb, a GreenSpace partner during Love Parks Week, are now taking applications for the 2010 Orange Thumb Grants. They are offering 10 community groups the chance to receive:
• Up to £1000 of Fiskars tools
• Up to £1000 of other gardening materials/products
• Up to 20 Fiskars Orange Thumb t-shirts
• One commemorative plaque
The closing date for applications is 31 October 2009 and the winners will be announced in March 2010. Application forms and more information can be found here.
The Orange Thumb team have already been out and about with their Fiskars tools in Huddersfield, clearing an old allotment site in Dewhurst Road, Fartown. Currently overrun with weeds, brambles and debris, the site is needed to provide space for a local enterprise centre for special needs students to grow food. The first step will be to help members of the community outreach project to clear the area so that paths can be built for the students. Once cleared, the site will be used to plant fruit trees and other food crops. More
The Secret Millionaire to fund charitable projects
The Big Lottery Fund and Channel 4’s The Secret Millionaire have teamed to give viewers of the programme a chance to act on the charitable inspiration fuelled by the show. Community groups can apply or nominate projects for grants of between £300 and £10,000 from the Secret Millionaire Fund.
More
Grants to help community campaigns
The Woodland Trust is offering small grants of up to £100 to assist community action groups in campaign activities in areas where ancient woodland is at risk.
More
If you find a grant/funding scheme you think may help other community groups please email Matthew Hartgrove at community@green-space.org.uk
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General news and features |
CABE re-launch website with new features
CABE have recently re-launched their website and created two new pages: one for community groups and one for green space managers. The new pages bring together all the relevant CABE content, publications and resources for each group into one place.
Online woodland creation advice centre launched
The Woodland Trust has launched a new section on its website aimed at providing groups with help and advice on planting their own woodlands. The site includes information on where to plant trees, when to plant them and where you might be able to find funding. More
Community Cash Back
Have your say on how £4m of recovered criminal assets is spent. Community Cashback is a new scheme in England and Wales which gives local people a chance to have a say on how money is spent in their local area. More
Is your park the best in Britain? Last chance to enter
The deadline to enter Britain’s Best Park 2009 is fast approaching. The annual competition is a chance for friends groups and park managers to explain why they think they have Britain’s Best Park. The closing date is Friday 28 August. More
RHS Dig Together Day
RHS Dig Together Day is a nationwide celebration and awareness-raising day for gardening clubs and horticultural societies. The event invites gardening groups to open their doors and invite members of their communities to find out more about what they do, and learn some new gardening skills along the way. The event takes place on 5 and 6 September.
Dig Together Day will be launched on 1 September with a village fete-style event at the St James’s Park allotment.
More
Top three parks tweeters
It’s not just the birds in the park that are tweeting, there are now a number of environmental groups keeping their local communities up-to-date via social networking site Twitter. The site allows members to give real-time updates on what they’re doing, and has attracted a widespread following amongst politicians and media professionals. Here are our top three park-related Twitter feeds:
• Project Dirt is an active community, serving to link environmental projects.
• Incredible Edible Todmorden aims to increase the quantity of food grown in Todmorden.
• Capel Manor College features updates from London's specialist horticultural college and gardens.
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Events |
1 September
Dig Together Day
Organiser:
RHS/Royal Parks
Location:
St James's Park London
Contact:
www.rhs.org.uk
The RHS Dig Together Day is a nationwide celebration and awareness-raising day for gardening clubs and horticultural societies.
5-6 September
Dig Together Day
Organiser:
RHS/Royal Parks
Location:
Nationwide
Contact:
www.rhs.org.uk
The RHS Dig Together Day is a nationwide celebration and awareness-raising day for gardening clubs and horticultural societies.
12 September
The Glass-House Study Tour: Spaces
Organiser:
The Glass-House
Location:
Glasgow
Contact:
www.theglasshouse.org.uk
The Glass-House is delivering a free study tour to some inspiring open spaces across Glasgow. This is a one day event for community groups who are at an early stage in developing open space design projects in their neighbourhood.
24 September
:spaces: green places for head spaces
Organiser:
Forum for Environmental Volunteering Activity
Location:
Redhall Walled Garden, Edinburgh
Contact:
www.feva-scotland.org
This inspirational event is a ‘conference with a difference’ which involves learning about the impact our outdoor spaces can have on our lives through hearing stories, through meeting new people and through experiencing first hand some outdoor practical hands-on activities around the garden at Redhall.
29 September
Raising the Standard
Organiser:
GreenSpace
Location:
Manchester
Contact:
www.green-space.org.uk
This one-day conference will focus on sharing best practice from the Green Flag Awards, and will feature a variety of practical site tours, workshops and case studies.
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Community Profile |
Matthew Wall, Chair
Friends of East Greenwich Pleasaunce
What inspired you to get involved with the Friends of East Greenwich Pleasaunce?
Our house overlooks the Pleasaunce – it was one of the main reasons we bought it 15 years ago. It is a very pretty little park with a wide variety of interesting trees, including Holm Oak, White Bark Birch, Lime, and Weeping Beech, and is the only green space of any size in East Greenwich. It also has a naval cemetery with fascinating historic links to the old Greenwich Hospital. But when we moved in it clearly needed some TLC. My wife had previously been involved in a forerunner to the Friends group – campaigning for new play equipment, dog bins and so on – but when the council gave its backing to Friends groups we decided to set up our own in 2006. When committed people get together they can achieve amazing things.
What does being part of the group involve?
Regular Friends meetings to plan events and discuss local issues; liaising with the council parks department and other officers; editing and updating our Friends website; leafleting local residents and arranging publicity in local newspapers; organising and running events; fundraising; attending relevant council meetings where the Friends Group should have a voice. Basically, the more active you can be the more chance of your voice being heard.
What do you feel has been your greatest success as a group?
We have had so many! Since 2006 our membership has grown to over 200 and our events have grown amazingly in popularity. Our annual Picnic in the Park is now attended by over 500 people and at our last Christmas Carols in the Park event (some 200 people came to that) Santa arrived on a fleet of Harley Davidsons! We helped achieve Green Flag status for the Pleasaunce, the building of a new cafe for the Park, and new planting of trees and flowers. But most of all, we’ve encouraged lots more people – young and old - to make use of what is a lovely green space with a fascinating history.
What made the group decide to run ‘Arty Picnic’ in the Pleasaunce?
We wanted to build on the success of our last picnic and came up with the arty theme as a way of supporting local talent and offering something a little different. We invited local artists to display their work and invited award winning children’s author/illustrator Petr Horacek to lead local children in creating a colourful mural which is now framed and mounted close to the park entrance. We also had four different bands providing live music, including a wonderful acoustic set from local pop star Glenn Tilbrook. It was a great success.
How did you gain sponsorship/support for this event?
Local Friends groups are collectively represented by the Greenwich Parks Friends Forum and the council generously decided to give this body over £30,000 to run a series of park-based events over the summer. We benefited from a slice of that funding and raised our own money selling drinks and refreshments at the event.
If you had to offer a friends group advice on starting and running an event during Love Parks Week what would that be?
Start small and be realistic about the resources you have. It is better to have a small success than a big failure. Be patient – think two or three years ahead – and build up gradually. Publicity is also very important.
What does the future have in store for the Friends of East Greenwich Pleasaunce?
We have now established East Greenwich Pleasaunce as an excellent venue for events, so we are in talks with the Council about hosting family fun days, Fair Trade markets, and Arts and Music festivals. But as the events get bigger so does the need for more volunteers. We’re building up an email distribution list and trying to widen our membership as a result.
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Feedback |
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COMMUNITY BENCH is the online newsletter of GreenSpace aimed specifically at community groups. It reports on community green space issues across the country and the work of organisations and groups that take an interest in the green spaces.
Past issues can be viewed in the community news section of our website at:
http://www.green-space.org.uk/community/cgparchives.php/
Written by: Matthew Hartgrove, Network Officer, GreenSpace
Edited by: Jessica Reid, Senior Events Officer, GreenSpace
To be removed from the list reply to this email with ‘remove’ in the subject header. To add someone to the COMMUNITY BENCH please follow this link http://www.green-space.org.uk/community
The COMMUNITY BENCH e-newsletter is published and circulated by GreenSpace. Any comments, opinions or views expressed in the COMMUNITY BENCH do not necessarily reflect the views of GreenSpace Forum Ltd, its staff, partners or funders. Replication or duplication of this publication, in whole, or in part, without written permission is strictly prohibited. © 2009 GreenSpace.
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