Brighter Borough - Change in the process

Each Cllr gets an amount of money each year to spend on environment and community projects. This is called Brighter Borough. This has happened for a number of years now and the process has been you ask your Cllr{s) for funding for xyz. They then fill out a form and send it to the Council to process. Once that has been approved the Council would send out the paper work to the group/ organiser to fill and return, with supporting documents. Once the Council has received that and checked it they would then send a cheque out. The process from start to finish can take a number of weeks.

The Council from Monday are changing the process and going electronic. So the new system from Monday is that you will ask your Cllr(s) for funds, they will say yes or no. They will then give that person/ group a web link to go onto and fill out the form on the Internet. Once that has been completed and the submit button hit that will in turn send an email to the Cllr to approve. Once they hit apply it will then send it to the Council, who then will approve and then payment will go into the groups bank account within about 10 days after.

Important

All groups will have to register with the Council first before the first request has submitted. If you are a group that has either asked for funding before or you think you might apply at some point in the future you need to register with the Council. If you do not do this until you ask for the fund it will delay your payment, so it is worth registering now, so your details are on the Council's system. You will need to provide the groups details and show an original bank statement for the group. Also you will need an email, although this doesn't need to be a group email it can be a personal one.

Questions

I can hear some of you say, " I have applied before so why do I need to register again?"

All the details for the groups that have applied are on paper format. So the Council want people to apply again electronically.

Why do they need to see a original bank statement?

Because in the past the Council sent out cheques they didn't need to know bank details. Now that they are sending payment electronically they need to make sure the money is not going into a personal bank account.

What happens if I have an application already in?

If you have an application currently in then there is no need to worry as it will be processed inline with the current process. There is no need to register, unless you are likely to apply in the future.


For more guidance on Brighter Borough and what they can be used for HERE is a link to help with that too.