Decision details

The decision report covers: (1) One-year small Project Grants 2011-12; and (2) Three-year funding agreements with Key Strategic Organisations 2011-14: Grants for Year 1 (2011-12) and indicative funding for Years 2 and 3 (2012-13 and 2013-14)

The Cabinet Member agrees that:

(1) Grants are awarded to voluntary arts organisations for 2011-12 (One-year funding for Arts Project Grants, amounts under £5000: Appendix 1 refers) and 2011-14 (Three-year funding for Key Strategic Organisations, amounts under £5000: Appendix 2 refers).  

(2) An allocation of £6,260 is made for small grants for Cultural Olympiad projects (Appendix 1 refers).

(3) An allocation of £4,000 is made to Keynsham Town Council to support its Arts Development Officer post (Appendix 2 refers).

The Council has allocated an Arts Development budget and officers (2.7 fte) to manage the commissioning of services delivered by voluntary arts organisations, to support and develop the voluntary arts sector, and to monitor organisations’ performance against Funding Agreement performance indicators.

The Council has a long-standing commitment to ensuring that the majority of its Arts Development budget is used to commission external providers to deliver arts activities and services.

A rigorous assessment scoring system, externally moderated, was employed to ensure that officers’ recommendations for funding were consistent, fair and transparent.  Whilst recommendations could be made to invest greater or lesser amounts in each applicant organisation, officers advised that the recommendations put forward will ensure the best value for money from the available budget, a high quality of work delivered to residents of the local authority area, and the most strategic outcomes and benefits from the investment of resources.