Work on the first two phases of the roll-out is progressing well with surveys carried out across the areas and initial action planning days scheduled.
The Your Dumbarton West event took place on Saturday 23rd April and the Your Parkhall, North Kilbowie and Central event took place on Saturday 7th May.
A Balloch and Haldane event is not being scheduled as we have linked into to both the charette locally and the existing local plan developed with support of the National Park team.
The phase two areas of Clydebank East, Dumbarton North and Bonhill and Dalmonach are progressing.
- Surveys are being circulated and results collated to pick up on immediate actions to be taken.
- Walkrounds are being scheduled for each area to carry out a visual audit of the area and hear directly from local residents about any concerns or opportunities.
- Following these walk rounds, development events will be scheduled.
A very successful community-led action planning day was held in Alexandria on 20 February 2016.
This event built on the excellent feedback received from the community survey and was the first step in getting a community-led action plan detailed. Around 100 people attended the drop-in session with almost half signing up to be involved in further development of the action plan.
From the day, a list of key local priorities developed and will inform the next steps of the plan development.
Significant Council support has been aligned to the roll out and sustainability of Your Community through a £1m capital investment fund detailed in the 2016/17 Strategic Budget agreed in February 2016.
This fund is intended to support the expansion of Your Community and help deliver on community-led activity and improvement in each local area. The impact of this specific Your Community investment will be enhanced through access to wider funding streams such as (i) the Council Community Capital Fund and (ii) Community Sports Fund as well as (ii) external funding sources.
The Your Community investment budget will be used to support delivery of projects identified through community-led action plans. However a proportion of the budget will also be assigned to each of the 17 Your Community areas for a participatory budgeting small grants process. This will allow community groups, organisations, and individuals to make bids against the pot for community projects, to be voted on by local residents.
Funding is available from local and national funding streams to support the Your Community aspirations at a local level.
Over and above the participatory budgeting fund available West Dunbartonshire Council has also allocated funding pots for community sports and the environment.
This is enhanced by the regeneration funding linked to the delivery of the charette action plans and national pots such as the Empowering Communities Fund.
The Your Community team will also be supporting local consultation and engagement on issues specific to local communities. Over the next few months work will take place with local residents on the future of the former St Eunan’s site, which sits within Linnvale and Drumry area, and the future use for Bruce Street Baths, sitting within the Clydebank East area.
There is an increasing drive nationally for community planning partners to work at a local community level on the design and delivery of services. The Your Community initiative also supports delivery of the strategic priorities of the Council and ensures we have an active and engaged community.
West Dunbartonshire Councillor Martin Rooney 