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Values into Action

Values into Action. - lessons for community development and sustainable regeneration. fch: the organisation. We are a English Midlands based social business. Our goals are: To provide high quality services tailored to people’s needs and preferences

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Values into Action

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  1. Values into Action - lessons for community development and sustainable regeneration.

  2. fch: the organisation We are a English Midlands based social business. Our goals are: • To provide high quality services tailored to people’s needs and preferences • support which helps people to live fuller lives • neighbourhoods which are better places to live.

  3. Neighbourhood Management The fch approach • Anticipating National Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal • Pilot neighbourhood initiatives • Anti-poverty • Sustainability of neighbourhoods • Service delivery • Building capacity • Enabling communities to have greater impact on decisions

  4. Neighbourhood Management The Way Forward • New Government initiatives for joint working • Community-led approaches, not short-termist approaches of the past • Most effective strategies engage at all levels • fch Locality Teams provide nucleus for such strategies in its key neighbourhoods

  5. Sparkbrook, Birmingham • Among most deprived areas in the UK • First housing action area in Britain, 1975 • Inner city partnership programme funding for the area in 1980s • Urban Action Plan for the area (1995), developed by Birmingham City Council • SSTARI Regeneration Initiative (1996) • Designated health improvement area

  6. Local Service Partnership A Community Vehicle for Sparkbrook • Involves fch, Focus Housing Group and Birmingham City Council • Specially established body delivering a range of services • Involves local community in running multi-function services

  7. Background to LSP • Inadequate communication between agencies • Agencies not well integrated with SRB Partnership • Facilitating Childcare Project • Quality of Life Project (CURS, 2000) research demonstrated need for better co-ordination of regeneration activities

  8. Local Service Partnership • Objectives: • To obtain accurate information and views from the community about the neighbourhood • To develop a suitable mechanism that meets local needs and addresses issues of decline • To establish a model of neighbourhood community involvement • Structure • Board comprises 4 local community representatives (including schools and businesses) • 5 local residents • 3 landlord representatives

  9. Community involvement in the LSP • Consultation involved tenants and service users of fch and Focus • Identified need for capacity building • Role of capacity building to develop, later to include prioritisation and budget reviews • Emphasis on active involvement of tenants, rather than local councillors

  10. Community facilitator project • Enables effective and inclusive involvement of the community in establishing the LSP • Local community mapping exercise and developing database of local groups • Enables groups to access training, employment and funding opportunities • Identifies opportunities for joint working by social landlords in providing “street services” • Aims to build capacity of wider community, not just social housing tenants • Transferable model of community empowerment, if developed successfully

  11. Contending with other City Council priorities Some activities overtaken by politics of whole stock transfer Provides useful information to shape future City proposals Confirms the need for holistic view of service provision Financial viability Three -stage process Multi-landlord v single landlord experiences Involving frontline staff Evidence - anecdotal v. empirical Lessons learned to date

  12. A paradigm shift • UK Government expects cultural shift in attitudes of staff in statutory and local agencies • Could take up to 10 years for local strategic partnerships to include genuine community representation • Statutory agencies vulnerable to overnight changes in political leadership and direction • Local Agencies in a better position to sustain this shift

  13. Conclusions Effective Neighbourhood Management must… • recognise that holistic working is resource intensive and needs time to develop • not create structures which are set in concrete at the outset • recognise the need for informal as well as formal structures - the “weak” tools of persuasion and knowledge building as well as the “strong” tools of regulation

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