Funding

Voluntary Centre Services and Lincolnshire Community and Voluntary Service offer a free web-based information advice service for organisations who are looking for sources of funding to help them grow and develop. See Lincolnshirevolunteering.org.uk/find-funding for more information and advice about local and national funding opportunities, links to funding search engines, information on how to apply for funding, links to relevant local county strategies and details of the Lincolnshire Funding Ready training programme.

A partnership between Lincolnshire Community and Voluntary Service (LCVS), Voluntary Centre Services (VCS) and Lincolnshire County Council (LCC) has designed and is delivering the Funding Ready training programme, focused on improving funding success for Lincolnshire’s voluntary sector organisations.

The programme is broken down into practical workshops covering:

Getting your organisation/project ready for grant funding
Researching your beneficiaries
Evidencing Need
Funding Sources
Proving Outcomes
Writing a Successful Bid

Additional support is available to help with:

Searching for grant funding schemes that suit your needs
Understanding and meet funders’ eligibility criteria
Writing a realistic plan and budget
Getting a constitution and/or appropriate policies in place
Looking at other ways to maximise your group’s income, such as using gift aid and other tax-efficient methods or running trading activities / fundraising programmes.

Local Government Funding	Grants are available from a wide range of local government sources (County / District / Borough Councils or Parish Councils).
National Grant Funding	There are a number of organisations that provide grants. (e.g., the National Lottery Community Fund). They will provide a much larger amount of money than local or charitable sources.
Regional Grant Funding	Most common regional grants tend to be set amounts of money from central government or regional or local bodies such as a local authority.
International Grant Funding	Tends to be available for much larger projects that have a common interest amongst other countries. (e.g. European Union).
Charitable Trust Funding	These are philanthropic organisations which means that they exist to give money to charitable causes. Grants are awarded to support projects that meet their own charitable objectives. Visit the Lincolnshire Community Foundation website for information on local charitable trust funding.
Fundraising	There are a number of different ways to raise funds for your group that do not mean that you have to sign up to terms and conditions. Some of these options include approaching local companies or organisations, individuals, hosting events, running own fundraising events, generating income, gift-aid or trading services. Your group might like to set up a “sub-committee” who will focus on fundraising for the group and can include people who have relevant skills to spread the workload and they don’t need to be part of your Management Committee.

The Lincolnshire Community Foundation’s mission is to create a county of thriving places where the people that live in them are healthy, happy, resilient and empowered.

They provide advice on social enterprise and help on how to apply for community group funding through various grants. Visit Lincolnshire CF’s Grants webpage to find which grants are currently available Available Grants – Lincolnshire Community Foundation (lincolnshirecf.co.uk)

Funding

Useful links