Community Resilience Group Weekly Briefing

[posted at the request of Strathdearn Community Council

Community Renewal Fund

In response to the UK Government’s recent announcement on the UK Community Renewal Fund, Highland Council are seeking bids from organisations wishing to deliver activity as part of this. Eligible applicants can come from public sector organisations, higher and further education institutions, private sector companies and registered charities. It is predominantly a revenue based fund and bids will be for 2021/22 only with activity ending by 31 March 2022.

Project delivery must align with at least one of the investment priorities contained within the UK Community Renewal Fund Prospectus namely:

Investment in skills
Investment for local business
Investment in communities and place
Supporting people into employment

Further information can be found at https://bit.ly/CommunityRenewalFund and bids must be submitted to the Council by 17:00hrs on 14 May 2021.

Community Support Co-ordinators

A reminder that the closing dates for these posts is Monday 10 May. There are 10 posts located across Highland: Inverness, Nairn, Aviemore, Lochaber, Skye, Sutherland, Caithness, Ross-shire East, West and Mid (3 posts). They are fixed term posts for 12 months.

The main purpose of the role is to co-ordinate and deliver humanitarian and resilience support, building community capacity and resilience through active engagement with a range of bodies including community and public sector organisations. There will be a focus on developing local relationships and networks with community bodies, encouraging participation and involvement, with an emphasis on addressing poverty and recovery.

The posts will be part of the Community Support and Ward Management team and although based in one area, will work as part of the wider area-based team to support projects and activity across the broader area.

People can apply online at: www.myjobscotland.gov.uk/councils/highland-council/jobs/community-support-co-ordinator-216447

Community Food Growing Co-ordinator

We are also recruiting to the post of Community Food Growing Co-ordinator. This is a 24 month post and the post-holder will lead on the delivery of the Council’s approach to supporting food growing initiatives across Highland, as required under the Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015. In doing so, the post-holder will help to reduce food poverty across Highland, improve community resilience whilst also building community capacity through active engagement with a range of bodies including community and public sector organisations.

A key initial focus will be finalising the Council’s draft food growing strategy, Growing Our Future, whilst taking forward the key actions identified within the strategy. The post-holder will be expected to support community engagement activity related to the food growing agenda as well as the Council’s ‘Placed Based approach’, including developing local relationships and networks with community bodies, encouraging participation and involvement, with an emphasis on improving food growing outcomes and healthy lives across the region.

People can apply online at: www.myjobscotland.gov.uk/councils/highland-council/jobs/community-food-growing-co-ordinator-216449

Power Outages

The weather has been quite challenging this week and some communities were without power for a time on Thursday. There is a checking service on the SSEN website which allows people to track whether there are any faults in their area and the estimated time for power restoration.

www.ssen.co.uk/PowerTrack/

Vaccination Update

The latest update from NHS on the vaccine can be accessed at the following link: www.nhsinform.scot/covid19vaccine

Food Support for Groups

We know that a number of you continue to provide support to the most vulnerable in your communities and that most of you already have well defined routes for accessing food to provide this support or are supporting individuals to access their shopping or community fridges/food tables.

If you are struggling to access food to continue support to vulnerable people locally, please do contact us through the policy mailbox and we can look at ways that we can support your group going forward.

Contact: policy6@highland.gov.uk

Resilience Network Contacts

Should any group not already be involved with these networks, the contact details for each is below.

Caithness –If any groups aren’t involved and wish to be please contact Alan Tait at Caithness Voluntary Groups allan@cvg.org.uk

Sutherland – If any groups aren’t involved and wish to be please contact Karina Ross at Highland and Islands Enterprise karina.ross@hient.co.uk
East Ross – Helen Ross, Ward Manager, will facilitate this network. For future involvement in this network please contact policy6@highland.gov.uk
Black Isle – If any groups aren’t involved and wish to be please contact Asia Cielecka at communities@black-isle.info
Wester Ross and Dingwall – Dot Ferguson, Ward Manager, will facilitate this network. For future involvement in this network please contact policy6@highland.gov.uk
Skye and Raasay – If any groups aren’t involved and wish to be please contact Fiona Thomson at Skye Community Response Development Team fiona@portreeandbraes.org
Lochaber – Emma Tayler, Assistant Ward Manager, will facilitate this network. For future involvement in this network please contact policy6@highland.gov.uk
B&S –If any groups aren’t involved and wish to be please contact Karen Derrick enquires@vabs.org.uk
Inverness City – David Haas, City Manager, will facilitate this network. For future involvement in this network please contact policy6@highland.gov.uk
Inverness Rural – Charles Stephen, Ward Manager, will facilitate this network. For future involvement in this network please contact policy6@highland.gov.uk
Nairn – Willie Munro, Ward Manager, will facilitate this network For future involvement in this network please contact policy6@highland.gov.uk